Reciprocity
by springandbysummerfall
Summary: Bulma and Vegeta wrestle with their feelings for each other during the three year period…and once Puar blasts them into space, the pair become further entangled in the machinations of some old foes of Vegeta's. Can they survive long enough to get home and go on their first date?
1. Two Weaknesses

Disclaimer: I don't own the characters, but I do own the content.

If I did own it, there would have been more cowbell.

* * *

The wind whipped at Bulma's hair and she almost pitched forward, her heels slipping on some unknown on the floor of the outdoor bar and grill. She chuffed indignantly, except the clink and clatter of dishes and the din of Saturday night laughter quickly absorbed it.

"A Long Island, please!" She hollered down to the bartender, who seemed to register her request without acknowledging that she was there. With glass in hand, she took a sip and grimaced. "Stiff," she muttered, beginning to make her way back towards the table.

Yamcha's baseball team had made it to the playoffs, and all of their friends had been invited to celebrate. Not unexpectedly, the only ones that bothered to show up were Puar, Krillin, his blockheaded girlfriend Maron, Oolong, Roshi, and herself. She didn't miss the others-Tien, Piccolo, and Vegeta were party poopers anyway-but she was upset that Goku hadn't managed to drop by. Bulma suspected it had to do with his wife. Her eyes narrowed and she sipped angrily at her drink. Unfortunately, she didn't seem to be in the mood for fun tonight herself.

Bulma slid into the booth beside Krillin. "Where is everyone?" she asked, taking in the empty table.

Krillin, who appeared to have drunk enough to mistake the leather seat for a hammock, pointed towards the pool tables. She could barely make out Roshi and Oolong as they hovered outside a sloppily drunk cat fight. She scanned the crowd and located Yamcha, who was laughing and patting one of his teammates on the back as they racked pool balls. Puar was hovering in line for the bathrooms, casting anxious gazes at Yamcha.

Which brought her back to her displeasure with Goku's absence tonight. She understood that he was now a married man raising a family, training vigorously for the Android threat...but she resented ChiChi for chaining her normally free spirited, outgoing and oldest friend to Mt. Paozu. And although she wasn't ready to admit it, marriage, children, and isolation were distant and strange concepts that she was more than happy to avoid for the time being.

Whether or not they were overlooked, the transformations in Goku's life were impacting her as surely as the changes in her relationship with Yamcha. She sighed, watching Yamcha line up the cue ball and laugh in an exchange between a teammate and a group of girls that she was both literally and figuratively removed from. Things had changed between them. Since being revived, Yamcha was content spending all of his time on his baseball career, his friendships with his teammates, and his casual martial arts training. They were a couple by default these last few months since his revival, and it seemed like he had every intention of seeing their life continue in this manner. Sure, she had tried knocking him down a peg or two, but he was quickly defensive and easily frightened away from the discussion. He seemed totally unconcerned in addressing the way she was stewing like a pot left to boil over._ Ever since the Saiyans...The Saiyans changed everything._

"I think I'm going to get going," Bulma heard herself say distantly.

Krillin turned toward her with a look of surprise. While she was submerged in thought, Puar had returned, and she looked at Bulma with concern.

"Tell Yamcha congratulations for me," Bulma requested impartially, as she scooted out of the booth.

It wasn't until she had stepped out onto the sidewalk that she resurfaced from the tangle of her emotions and realized, with only a little guilt, that she had just abandoned her boyfriend at his own party. The surf roared distantly behind the bar and grill as it retreated from and overwhelmed the sand over and over again. The creak of the palms stiffly swaying in the breeze punctuated the conversations of the people who passed her as if she weren't there. It was noticeably cooler since the sun had set, although still balmy.

She fingered the capsule case tucked inside her garter. Was all this emotional malaise and loneliness just her adjusting to getting older? Or maybe she was refusing to grow up? She slipped a capsule out and threw it into an empty parking space. When the smoke cleared, she slid on to her motorbike, her dress hiking dangerously, inciting hot blooded glances her way from groups of bored university boys. She slicked back the stray hairs from her face. Sweat was beginning to pool in between her breasts and down her back, causing the satin to cling to her.

She wanted nothing more than to be home, heaping whip cream and strawberries onto shortcake, watching reruns, maybe harassing her houseguest until she passed out on the couch. Just home. Deep blue clouds skittered across the violet night sky as she raced through West City, streaking past block after city block of indulgent nightlife. Tears obscured her visibility, the indistinct scenery matching her gritty and displaced mood. Her mad dash across the city was as enflamed as her desire for something wild, something or someone who would make her feel hungered for once again.

* * *

After drifting up the drive and killing the motor, she capsulated her bike and headed for the front door of her home at Capsule Corporation. As she cut through the room in the dark, she glanced over the breakfast bar that divided the living room and the kitchen. The light over the kitchen island glowed softly. Underneath stood a figure straight out of Grecian myth. Vegeta stood feasting over a large roasting pan, still wearing his training shorts and sneakers. The muscles in his forearms and chest jumped as he picked apart the bird, fixing her with a stare.

"What a surprise to see you here," Bulma said dryly as she set her capsule case on the bar.

"Look what the cat dragged in," Vegeta replied through a mouthful of rotisserie chicken. Given his normally impeccable manners, she assumed he really just couldn't help himself when it came to her. He had resided at Capsule Corp for months now and his dedication to testing her knew no limits. His chest rose and fell as he quietly devoured the bird under the soft glow.

Heels clicking on linoleum, Bulma sidled over, leaned over him and swiped a sliver of dark meat. She was surprised she didn't get her hand bitten off, though she felt his eyes on her.

"Just how many drinks have you had?"

"As if it's any of your business." Bulma crossed her arms and tossed her head back. "I've only had one drink tonight, and it was one sorry Long Island. Are we playing 20 Questions?"

"You smell like a saloon, that's all."

Bulma's tone changed abruptly. "Oh. Can you smell my new perfume? I forget, your Saiyan senses are more sensitive than ours."

Vegeta choked a little. "I can smell a variety of odors on you. None of them pleasant."

"Well, some people appreciate the way I smell!" Bulma growled. Changing tactics, she quickly grinned and winked over one round, milky shoulder as she began raiding the cabinets for snack food. "I am a highly sought after woman, you know."

"Which clears up why the gravity room is busted again." Seeing her confusion, he continued. "There's nothing between your ears but air and exaggerated self importance."

"Vegeta," she scolded, leveling a glare at him and ignoring his retort. "I've told you multiple times. You can't engage the new operating system above 150 Gs!" She threw her arms in the air. "We can't afford to keep patching up the GR every time you're having a bad day!"

He chucked the foil pan, now dispatched of meat, into the trashcan and turned to wash his hands. "Who's saying I'm having a bad day? One look at your hair and I can have a chuckle for the next decade." He smirked.

"That's the pot calling the kettle black. I would have figured you'd respect my perm a little bit more. After all, _your _hair is just as tall, _and_ it's as obnoxious as you are. At least I'm not dependent on mine to ride roller coasters."

Bulma pivoted on her small heeled foot, striding back through the living room and towards the stairs that led to the second floor bedrooms. She could practically hear the steam whistling out of his ears behind her. _Rule #52 When Living With A Saiyan Prince: _No One_ Insults The Prince's Hairdo. _

Vegeta's steps pounded up the stairs behind her. "Woman! We haven't even discussed the Gravity Simulator. I expect it will be in working order when I wake up," he ground out.

"Vegeta, it's two o' clock in the morning," she lectured as she strode down the hall to her bedroom. "The only thing I'm doing with any certainty is taking a bath and then sleeping 'til noon."

"You better be kidding, woman."

Bulma abruptly turned on her heel inside her doorway, nearly causing a collision as the Prince measured the distance between them.

"I am not kidding. If you think I'm waiting on you hand and foot while you stay at Capsule Corporation, then you've got another thing coming." Bulma promptly slammed the door on his face.

Vegeta's head spun as he stood dumbly at the door. His 25 years as a soldier in Frieza's massive intergalactic army did not prepare him for Bulma. It's not that he hadn't been disrespected before-life as one of Frieza's top henchmen was cutthroat. There existed a constant competition between them on the path to power through strength. Vegeta left vying for the lizard's affections to the truly vile and depraved, and although he usually counted himself among them, he did not suck up to the Ice-jinn bastard anymore than was necessary for his survival. Leading his elite squadron of Saiyans around the universe as carefully groomed chaos agents and enduring year after year of a ranked and severe martial system tended to snuff out any authenticity and altruism he had. The only times that he was able to revel in a show of personality was when he fought for glory and righteousness, his pride as he incinerated civilizations a demonstration of his stolen heritage...all of which left him sorely lacking in how to deal with a woman's simple refusal. Never mind that he had little experience with women as it was.

It was this pride, compounded by his confusion of the opposite sex, that took a direct hit, and it was this increasingly furious and dismayed bafflement that led Vegeta to twist open Bulma's bedroom doorknob and charge in. His eyes swept the empty room, but it only took him a second to find another door closed to him on the far side of the bed. Vegeta stalked across the room, this time his grip warping the door knob as he barged in.

"Any last words before I-"

Too late, Vegeta heard the water pounding into the bath tub as he was met with a wall of steam. Bulma's left foot was perched on the toilet lid as she hovered over her stiletto, her fingers stilling on the buckle. His eyes, with a rare lack of volition, followed the sweep of her calf up to the curve of her milky thigh as it met the scrap of cloth that left most of her round bottom exposed. Her middle made a tidy little hourglass, the top of which nearly spilled out of a strapless bra as she gaped at the Saiyan who stood blushing furiously before her. Before Bulma could think to fill her lungs up with air to shriek, he was gone.

When no angry Saiyans came crashing back in the room, Bulma tossed the rest of her clothing beside the hamper and slipped into the hot bath, her gawking surprise replaced by a broad grin as she slid farther into the bath. _It seems the superhuman Prince _does_ have a weakness. _


	2. Sht Gets Real

__ Sh*t Gets Real_

Disclaimer: As always, I don't own the characters. If I did own them, I'd have Toriyama working on the graphics to my favorite fan fiction right now...

* * *

Bulma woke up that Sunday at noon as promised. She noticed groggily that the Prince wasn't on the grounds of Capsule Corporation and sighed in relief. After a quick shower, she dressed and pulled on a jacket against the cold front that had moved in while she slept. Snatching a pastry and her capsule case off the breakfast bar, she strolled out of the house and hit the toggle on a capsule. With a plume of smoke, her hoverjet made its appearance in rock star style, and she set its course for Kame House.

Resting her feet on the dash, Bulma reflected on her night, rubbing her eyes sleepily. Vegeta's embarrassment as his eyes raked over her replayed in her mind. Was that the first fight he ever fled? Was he simply shocked to see his hostess in her skivvies? She supposed he just wasn't used to countering an attack of the epicurean kind. She thought of the saying about the spider being more scared of people than people are of it and snorted.

She landed the jet on the soft, sparkling sand of Kame Island and hopped out, sneakers sinking into surf.

"Hello?" Bulma called as she she stepped through the creaky screen door.

"Oh, hey, Bulma!" Krillin waved to her from the living room.

"Krillin, hey!"

"Hello," grunted Oolong from the couch, not bothering to look up from the TV.

"What's everyone up to? It sure seems quiet around here."

"Master Roshi is upstairs 'sleeping.'" Krillin snickered, curling his fingers around the word. "Launch didn't appreciate Roshi ogling her. She walloped him on the head with her gun and now nice Launch is nursing an ice pack on his forehead. He's knocked out cold," Krillin explained smugly. "What are you doing here?"

"I'm just here to pick up the tool belt I left here when Roshi talked me into fixing his kitchen sink. Ugh, that old pervert! I'm an engineer, not a plumber!" Bulma railed at the ceiling. "Have you seen it around?"

"I think it's underneath the TV," Krillin answered helpfully, pointing at the TV stand.

Bulma popped open the doors to the TV stand and let out a wail. "Ew! Look at all these filthy VHS's! You've really got to find some new friends, Krillin."

"Keep your hands off my tapes!" Oolong warned.

Bulma carefully extricated her tool belt from the inside of the TV stand and wiped her hands neurotically on her jeans as she stood up.

Krillin chuckled as he rubbed his bald head thoughtfully. "I think it's about time I struck out on my own, too. We're not getting any younger, here!"

"Speak for yourself," muttered Oolong.

Krillin's expression turned serious. "Uh, hey, B, have you talked to Yamcha since last night?"

Bulma frowned, playfulness forgotten. "We haven't spoken. Why?"

"Tien and Chiaotzu were wondering if you would deliver a letter to him. It's about meeting them in the mountains to train for the Androids. I bet even Vegeta has been busting his butt trying to put up a fight to these things. To become strong enough to take care of them by himself, probably," he muttered.

"Oh." Bulma was as deflated by the news as she was irritated. "It figures Yamcha would find another way to avoid me."

"Yamcha can't always be around," Krillin informed Bulma gently, "not if he wants to protect you. None of us can."

"Thanks for the lecture, Krillin," Bulma replied smartly, "but I will be just fine without you guys. Like that purple haired kid said, I outlast all of you, anyway."

"Ouch, Bulma. I just didn't want you to resent us for trying to save your ass, that's all."

Bulma softened. "You're a good friend, Krillin." She plucked the note from his fingers and sighed. "Yeah, I'll take it to him. Well, I've got things to do, people to see! See ya!"

"Don't let the door hit ya where Kame split ya," chirped Oolong.

"Piggy, piggy, PIGGY!" She shrieked as she strode out the door. Oolong leapt off the couch and bounded for the bathroom, flatulence following swiftly behind.

"How does that still work after all this time?" She heard Oolong plead as he emptied his bowels noisily into the toilet.

"Hmph. You boys, you think I can't handle myself," Bulma muttered menacingly as she marched across the sand, tool belt swinging in her grip. She didn't notice the turtle and an alligator donning red sunglasses who stiffened as she marched past, both who still managed a weak, albeit ignored "good afternoon."

"Men. I'll show you," she continued as she slammed the door, and the turtle and crocodile winced.

* * *

It was dusk by the time Bulma landed at Yamcha's apartment on the west side of West City. When Bulma rang his doorbell, Puar answered.

"Bulma!" The blue cat squeaked, enveloping Bulma's shoulder in a hug. "I wasn't expecting you!"

"Hi, Puar. I have a note to deliver to Yamcha. Is he around?" Bulma asked uncertainly, stepping in the doorway and peering around. She was in unfamiliar territory.

Since their return from Namek, Bulma had been so preoccupied with entertaining Nameks that she hadn't given much thought to more than the occasional check up on Puar, who kept up Yamcha's apartment while they waited for the dragon balls to revive him. Who knew Nameks were so good at poker? Although Puar was a close friend, in Yamcha's absence she was reduced to a weepy worrywart, and to be honest, it made Bulma just a little uncomfortable that she hadn't filled that role herself.

In the first few weeks after Yamcha was revived, he had popped into Capsule Corp with Krillin and a much happier Puar to chit chat with Bulma. But it wasn't long until he had become distractible and distant, which only worsened with time. His death had created a chasm between them, the intense experience of space travel, the Afterlife and Namek dividing them irreparably. And although Bulma had been willing to meet him in the middle, Yamcha didn't seem interested.

She wondered, not for the first time, how his death had changed him. Maybe it had made something clear to him, caused him to chase little known desires. She wondered how Vegeta's death had altered him. Vegeta poured himself into pushing his strength, his stamina and his discipline to its limits. She wasn't sure if that kind of rigorous training had been a habit of his before winding up on Earth, but it didn't take a brain surgeon to see that all that work was to fuel a race against Goku's phenomenal talent.

Goku not only seemed oblivious to the animosity but also unaffected by his own death at the hands of his brother, and his ascension to what was, for all intents and purposes, a thousand year old space legend. Perhaps Goku and Vegeta's kindred, competitive Saiyan spirits inoculated them against any soul searching.

But why was Yamcha eschewing the hard questions since his revival? Why was he committed only to a fast paced life of baseball and bros? She was fun, wasn't she? She wondered why there didn't seem to be any room for her.

"It doesn't look like he's home," Bulma noted softly.

"Um, he's at baseball practice," Puar confirmed.

"Oh. Well, would you mind giving this to him when he gets back? It's from Tien and Chiaotzu. I have a feeling that's where he'll be headed at the end of baseball season."

Puar seemed disappointed by the news. "Alright, Bulma. It was good to see you."

"You, too." Bulma turned toward the front door but hesitated. "Puar, you know, if you ever get lonely or need someone to talk to, you're welcome to come by Capsule Corp. You're not just Yamcha's friend, you're mine, too. It will be just us girls as the boys train," she smiled sadly.

At Puar's indecision, Bulma rushed to assure her. "Vegeta is busy training from dusk 'til dawn. He doesn't bite, I promise."

Then, out of the corner of her eye, she spotted something small and bright on the table inside the entryway.

"Alright! My capsule! Yamcha found it!" She snatched it off the in table, waving and calling goodbye over her shoulder. Bulma was in too much of a hurry as she powered up the jet to hear Puar's protests.

* * *

Bulma arrived home to the smell of barbeque and her mother's humming. She greeted her mom and nearly tripped up the stairs in her haste to make it up to Vegeta for embarrassing him the night before. Although she firmly believed that it wasn't her fault that he was too thickheaded to understand a closed bathroom door when he saw one, she knew he was alone here, left to float in strange waters. Bulma's home was enough to overwhelm anyone, not to mention that he must be reeling from culture shock. Whatever the madman did before he dropped in on Earth, she wasn't sure she wanted to know, but she had a feeling that his life out in the vacuum of space was a lot different than his new one in the comforts of West City.

Bulma quickly pulled on her coveralls and a CC cap, buckled her tool belt around her waist and strode across the lawn to the Gravity Room. It clanged and rocked as she approached it. Bulma frowned. Wasn't the GR supposed to be down? She rapped on the door.

The door opened and a sweaty Saiyan filled the doorway. Bulma gave him a cheeky grin and held up her wrench. Vegeta just stepped out of sight, which Bulma took to be an invitation in.

"I thought I told you nothing above 150 G's. That's why I'm here in the first place, isn't it?"

Vegeta had lowered himself to the floor, retreating into push ups on his fingertips.

"The room isn't powered on," he informed her, aloof. "But the fan has been running since the system crashed 16 hours ago."

Bulma frowned. "I better make sure the engine hasn't overheated, then. But what was all that racket I heard before you opened the door?"

Vegeta was suddenly landed a front flip right behind her. "Me," he breathed.

Bulma scrambled over to the engine bay across the room, hiding her blushing embarrassment. _Damn Saiyan, always looking for a way to make me lose my composure._ It didn't take long, though, until she was smeared with grease and littered with parts, pounding out code on the computer as she griped under her breath. She was brought back to reality when she was startled by Vegeta, who had bent down beside her. Bulma looked up at him as he frowned down at the mess.

"What's the problem?"

"When the new system crashed it altered the intake and exhaust system codes. The subsequent build up of pressure caused the engine core to overheat and alerted the simulator to lock down. I have to reset the system codes and replace some parts that got melted and warped, but otherwise it should be back up and running for you by midnight." She gave him a small smile and went back to loosening a bolt.

Vegeta looked at her peculiarly out of the corner of his eye and scoffed. "It's dinnertime. Aren't you going to eat first?"

Bulma tried very hard to stare above her into the dark bowels of the simulator and remark casually, "Nah. It shouldn't take long to fix." _Damn Saiyan, wouldn't accept help if it was offered on a silver platter.  
_

After a long pause she heard Vegeta grunt and step out of the simulator, headed presumably to clean them out of house and home. She groaned as her stomach grumbled and she imagined her mother's entire pan of burnt ends devoured by the Saiyan before the repairs were complete. Bulma sighed and returned to her monkey wrench.

* * *

It was going on 11:30 by the time she was done, and her stomach was warning her it was going to start eating itself really soon. Bulma put her tools away, wiped her hands on her coveralls and headed inside. The kitchen was deserted, and she ate a burnt ends sandwich in solitude, chewing thoughtfully as she mulled over installing additions to the GR that the new system, albeit untested, made capable. It was only after showering and slipping into a tank and boy shorts that she remembered the liberated capsule she had once used for nights over at Yamcha's, so long ago.

"Oh, yeah!" She exclaimed, climbing stiffly out of bed and reaching for the bright pink capsule on her night stand. Finally, she would be reunited with some of her favorite T shirts, a few blueprint pipe dreams she had drawn up on sleepless nights, and...

"A strap on!"

Leather lingerie and one single, incriminating adult toy fell gracelessly into a heap on her bed. Bulma stood gaping until the reality hit her full force in the stomach. Bulma's hand rose to her chest, her heart pounding a clamorous rhythm against her palm.

"This isn't mine. This isn't..."

She sank onto the edge of her bed.

"A strap on?"

* * *

It was only when she heard rustling in the kitchen that Bulma came to. It was...what, 4:30?...in the morning, and Bulma had been sitting listlessly in front of the TV in the living room for hours. A half eaten pint of ice cream sat forgotten in between her legs. An infomercial advertising a food processor for the low low price of $19.99 had been playing for the last hour.

Where had these last ten years gone? Adventure after adventure, one martial arts competition after another, running away from and fighting Pilaf, the Red Ribbon Army, and both Piccolos-it had made their companionship easy. She and Yamcha hadn't given any thought to their commitment or the future until he was revived; they had simply shared a place in each others lives as it moved forward one day after another. Bulma remembered his roguish good looks, his tacit enthusiasm and warm smile that had drawn her in in the first place. She had been the first pretty girl that he found the courage to speak to, making their individual quests for the dragon balls obsolete. They had bickered and made promises and taken their romance for granted with all the passion of first lovers.

Now, forced to evaluate their relationship, she came up short. Just when had the emotional distance lengthened irrevocably between them? Just when had the disconnect infiltrated their peace? Had there ever truly been a peace between them? She frowned in surprise. As far back as she could remember, their relationship had been pocked with dumb quarrels, but it was only in the months since his revival that their love for each other became corrosive. Was she to blame? What had she done to drive him away?

Yamcha was goodnatured, laid back, easy to please her...Was that it? Did his easy going nature provoke her to instant impatience? Was it those very things-his averageness, his mediocre ambition and will power, his interest in martial arts not for the passion of it but for the approval of his peers, his lack of interests in her interests, his lack of intensity like her intensity-that incited her to steamroll him? Their relationship had been trite for a long time, it seemed. It took a major change to make him ponder where he was going and what was worth valuing, and she hadn't made the cut. Although she felt numb against any more heartache at the moment, she decided that, despite the evidence of infidelity-_why couldn't he had resolved this with me rather than without me?_-the betrayal of their friendship hurt the worst. They had been through thick and thin together. Even if they weren't romantically involved, didn't he still care about her well being?

And now with the boys-men-all headed for battle, what was there for Bulma to do? What had occupied her time in the past-her relationship, her adventuring, her capricious affair with technology-all seemed childish in the face of the heady doomsday prophecy in less than three years time. Although she had no significant measure of ki and no martial arts skills to speak of, Bulma had always used her wits, her inventions, and her opportunism to sustain her during her travels. In several cases, her exceptionally powerful friends would have met a dead end had it not been for her resourcefulness. Although she could manage while her close friends trained for an apocalypse, what could possibly keep her busy, purposeful, important?

It was with the heavy clatter of a pan thrown into the sink that Bulma was shot through with an idea.

She couldn't believe it. How did she not think of this sooner? With all the modifications and upkeep that had to be done to the GR on a regular basis, why hadn't she thought of using particle technology on a microlevel, meaning less upkeep for her and more direct and effective results? She dully registered the couch cushion sink in beside her as her mind raced through algorithms and code, and her pint of ice cream was lifted out of her lap. Her head turned to the side as she became dimly aware that the person beside her was Vegeta. He smirked as he spooned her melted ice cream into his mouth. His hair was damp and he smelled like soap.

"Were you doing something, Onna?"

She considered bluffing to avoid embarrassment.

_Well, here goes._ "I grabbed a capsule from Yamcha's house by accident that was some other girls I think he's screwing." There, she said it.

Vegeta frowned at the wall and looked either distinctly uncomfortable or careless, empty carton on his knee.

"It had a strap on in it."

For a moment, she received only silence.

Then, great bales of laughter emptied out of Vegeta. He leaned back against the couch, posture still impeccable as he released sharp guffaws at Bulma's expense.

"So, Scarface has been taking it up the ass, has he? Call me when you've got real problems."

Bulma shocked them both when she reached out and gripped his shoulders. "Don't you see, Vegeta? I'm calling you _right now! _I've figured out how to help you while you train for the androids! And it all begins with ki enhancement technology!"

His irritated discomfort changed rapidly to keen interest.

"You don't say."

"And it will be so…very..._cool_," Bulma cooed, hoping to bait him.

His smirk deepened into dark satisfaction. "_Mondo_ cool."


	3. Science

__Science_

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights. But if I did, I'd have the voice actors voice all my favorite fanfics.

* * *

"Putting some pants on should be your first order of business."

Bulma looked down at herself dumbly. "Oh, yeah." She winked at him. "Funny, Vegeta, I didn't pin you for a prude."

He snorted. "Well, I didn't think you were offering."

"I am NOT that kind of girl! I'm a classy lady. Only the best for the best," she called out lightheartedly as she headed towards the stairs.

After shrugging into a t-shirt and skirt, her long night forgotten, she opened the door and found Vegeta leaning against the inside wall of the hallway with his arms crossed.

"What next?"

"Do you still have the suit you wore on Namek?"

He looked at her suspiciously. "Why do you want it?"

"I'd like to analyze the fibers of your old suit to see how I can retrofit them into Earth textiles. Surely that makes sense to you. I should be able to trust you of all people to be tech literate," she scolded him, putting her hands on her hips.

He glowered at her sass but gave her a nod, pulling off the wall and leading her down the hall. He left the bedroom door open and made his way into the closet. Bulma gave his room a once over while she ambled in after him. _It's so bare! He hasn't even tried to personalize it. _She imagined that the atmosphere of the room was more of a reflection of his character than anything decorative would be. Only his immediate surroundings were populated with the things that were meaningful to him-the kitchen, the gravity room-and not many of them were trinkets. It was also an indication that the man had never possessed anything of his own in his life. The thought made her sad.

He slipped the suit off its hanger and threw it to her. She looked down at the black material lying limply in her hand and ran her thumb over it gently.

"Let's head to my lab," she murmured. She led him back to the living room and down a hall hidden under the living room stairs, which emptied out into a fluorescent lit hallway. Although her home was technically the seat of Capsule Corporation, the only real places of professionalism were the labs on the lower level, where Bulma kept an office that had once been her father's. The very office, in fact, where he had created dynocaps. Business now operated out of a building downtown, although many of Capsule Corporation's creations still originated at the Briefs' home.

They turned at the end of the hallway and entered a small lab with room for a few tables and a desk in the corner. Books, blueprints, machine parts, and more than a few gossip magazines cluttered it. She rummaged through a drawer.

"Aha!" She held up a measuring tape. Vegeta's eyebrow raised.

Bulma blushed. "I need your measurements, if you want to avoid a tailor, Vegeta."

"Then what are you waiting for," he asked, clipped.

Bulma cleared her throat and measured his height quietly without being intrusive. It seemed unreal how suddenly she was so close to him. She could see his chest expand and fall under his black t-shirt. She tried getting a good look at him without him noticing, although she was sure he was monitoring her every movement. She could smell bar soap on him, her mother's laundry detergent, and a headier musk that came solely from a hardworking man. Her mother was right on that front. Before she could swoon, she bent determinedly and measured his inseam, feeling self conscious, and jotted down numbers on the nearest notepad.

She regretted that this suit wouldn't have the ability to expand and retract for his Oozaru form or have a hole to accommodate his tail. _What am I thinking? If he had his tail he'd be stomping all over me right now. _She stretched the tape around his hips and her heart gave a little jump. As she leaned in to measure his chest, he raised his arms to help her, and she glanced up at him nervously. Was it simply disinterest, or did she spy a flicker of amusement as he glanced down at her?

She waved the all clear as she scribbled the rest of the numbers down. Vegeta took a seat on the rolling chair beside her, resting his arms behind his head and letting his momentum roll him backwards until lightly hitting her cabinets._ Oh, Kame, the muscles on this man. C'mon, Briefs, get a grip!_ She hadn't lost her cool yet since he'd been strutting around Capsule Corporation and she wasn't planning on it any time soon.

"Now what," he asked drolly.

"Now I analyze your old suit, and hopefully I'm able to find some similarities between its fibers and fibers I have access to on Earth. The goal is to recreate your old suit, but with a few modifications-mostly, but not limited to, enabling ki control. With some time and effort, I should be able to make this suit a useful training tool that will help you harness and utilize your ki more efficiently. Which, in turn, allows more time to train and less effort and energy to be expended. It should optimize your training experience, at the least. There's almost no ceiling to the amount of power potentially conserved or room for power to be multiplied."

He regarded her gravely. "And the transformation to the Legendary. How will this effect it?"

She appealed to him earnestly. "Well, if that's your goal, I don't see how this can hurt."

"Then get on with it."

"It will require me to keep tabs on the balance between your energy expenditure and health," she warned him. "It means I'll have to monitor you up close our first attempt and we'll use diodes to track and report your progress as long as you're using the device."

"Hn. There better not be anymore to it then that, Onna."

"Why would I possibly want to sabotage your effort to save my world, Vegeta?"

"I'm not saving your world, woman. I'm not one of your Z Warriors. I'm satisfying my Saiyan need for a challenge and gaining strength and power on my way to knocking that fool Kakarot back to the next dimension."

"You're full of hot air, Vegeta."

"I'm deadly serious, Onna. Take care what you invest your tools in. It just might mean the end to your friendship with that third class clown."

Bulma narrowed her eyes at him.

"You may be opportunistic, but you helped Krillin and Gohan on Namek when you didn't have to," she argued, her tone suggesting he was completely dense. "You helped us think up a way to bring my friends back to Earth, even though you had nothing to gain from it. You just haven't been given a chance to relax or have friends, that's all."

"I'm a bastard, woman. I am not a charity case, let's be clear." He stood up and strode to the door. "When should I expect the suit to be done."

Bulma contemplated him, frustrated. "The materials have to be scrutinized, approved, ordered, woven, shipped. It may easily take a month or longer."

He stood with his back to her in the doorway, head cocked to the side. "Then you know where to find me once it arrives," he declared as he walked out.

_Common sense declares him a lost cause,_ she lamented. _So why am I so intent on helping him?_

* * *

It took just short of two weeks for the suit to be produced. Bulma received it gleefully. Thanks to the prestige of CC, who owned a handful of unusual but influential patents, grants for projects like this one were plentiful and manufacturers were at each others throats to deliver.

She relished the fabric of the new suit as she made her way across the grounds of Capsule Corporation. She had had two suits made-one identical to the tattered tactical suit he wore in his fight against Frieza, and one certified, ki enhancing training suit. "Courtesy of yours truly," she congratulated herself.

Suits hanging at her elbow, laptop crooked in her arm, and tool box in her grip, Bulma juggled items until she could knock at the door. The gravity room powered down with a heavy whirr and the door popped ajar. Bulma breezed in. Vegeta stood aside, arms crossed and body cocked indifferently away. She sat her laptop and toolbox on the console as a grin broke out on her face, and she turned towards him, suit pinched between her outstretched hands.

"Behold, your new suit."

Vegeta took it from her and examined it. The strands of energy facilitating compounds woven into the light armor were almost impossible to detect.

"I replaced your old suit as well," she said, handing over the other suit. "You know, for nostalgia." She winked at him as he took the other suit from her without looking and threw them both over the console.

"Hey, what are you-Eep!" She swiftly turned around just as Vegeta stepped out of his shoes and dropped his training shorts.

"And you call me a prude," he said, flashing her a wolfish grin.

"Just tell me when you're done," she recovered angrily.

She peeked over her shoulder as she heard the tinny peal of the zipper and had to put a lid on her interest as he stood, muscles flexing and rippling as he tested the fabric. _He's magnificent...and sooo dreamy. Why can't he be a charmer to boot?_

"I don't get it. What's the big deal?"

_Point proven._

"Well, this is where we test it's capabilities," she explained. She reached into her toolbox.

One eyebrow raised. "How's that?" He asked flatly.

"I'm going to need you to power up for me. To a quarter of your power, to half power, to three quarter power, and finally, to full power. I'm going to have to stand beside you, inside your ki. I'll hold this gauge against your chest, like a stethoscope, which will measure your power level and your vitals. I'll need you to hold your ki steady for about a minute before you power up to the next level."

Ghosts of blue ki began fluttering at her feet and lightly tossing her hair.

"Ready?"

Bulma swallowed and stepped closer to Vegeta, placing the gauge delicately on his chest. She had never been this up close and personal with something so powerful and lethal as ki energy before. She lifted her eyes to his, searching for certainty. His black gaze bore down on her, questioning her once more. She couldn't tear her eyes away. She nodded.

Blue ki began billowing around her feet, racing up her calves and skittering along her arms. Bulma's eyes widened and she glanced at the blue haze that now separated her and the rest of the world. Mesmerized, it took her a moment to realize the pressure and whine had reached an even pitch. She frowned resolutely at her gauge as its green light flickered erratically, sending data to her laptop in streams. It flickered orange and Bulma urged, "Half power."

The surging ki picked up and pawed at the edges of her skirt and danced up and over the nape of her neck, making her shiver. She could feel it trying to lift her off her feet. The mounting pressure again plateaued, and the energy swallowed her voice as she ordered, "Three quarters power."

Ki began ripping at her. She inhaled sharply as she stumbled into Vegeta's chest. Her eyes jerked up apologetically and she met his stare. It was much calmer even this much closer to him. Feeling suddenly serene, she reached around him languidly and gripped his shoulder blade, steadying herself against the storm of ki, and breathed, "Full power." He complied, closing his eyelids and throwing his head back, the muscles in his neck bunching. The light on the gauge batted weakly against the brilliancy of his ki as his heart beat beneath her hand. His chest tightened and he gave a roar, vibrating Bulma's core and sending a spiral of blue ki tripping across the floor. She pressed herself defensively against him, project forgotten, and closed her eyes as the hurricane of ki flared around her, rushing up, up, up, attempting to set on fire and consume everything around them. Bulma's world narrowed down to a singularity, indigo light blazing resplendently around them, pulsing like a heart beat, and whipping their hair. Bulma opened her eyes and met Vegeta's scrutinizing gaze. Ki reflected and darted off the metal walls, glancing off the auburn in Vegeta's hair as his full lashes lowered. Had their lips always been this close? The fit of her body against his seemed so familiar. Blue fire licked the walls and tempted the ceiling while another fire ignited in her belly as the pair was swallowed by a thick vortex of ki energy.

Faintly, there was the sound of pounding and hollering from outside the ship, nearly incomprehensible.

"Bulma? You in there? I need to speak with you!"

Vegeta extinguished his ki indolently, releasing her from the vacuum of its pressure as he absorbed it. He stepped away from her slowly, and she watched her arm distantly as it fell limply back to her side.

The banging continued. "Bulma? You okay?"

A deep frown settled on her face. She marched over to the door, tugging at her shirt hem, and whipped it open. "I'm busy," she announced.

Yamcha glanced behind Bulma, flickering with unease. "We need to talk."

"By all means," Vegeta mocked them as he stepped around them, chuckling his way down the ramp and towards the house even as the door closed behind him.

"You told him?" Yamcha squealed.

Bulma crossed her arms and turned her body away. "Why not? I had to tell somebody what a prick you are, and since I haven't seen hide nor hair of you or anybody else for weeks, who else could I have confided in!"

"I understand. Your mad. But let me explain."

"You can't explain that capsule away, Yamcha!"

"Just listen to me for a moment! Yes, that wasn't your capsule. Yes, it was full of...stuff...that was meant for the, um, bedroom. But the contents of that capsule were never used on me-err, in me-in my presence!" He stuttered lamely. Bulma scoffed, but Yamcha continued. "Please believe me, B, it's true! I didn't cheat on you. Yes, I brought a girl back to my house. But that was the end of it. She didn't even stay the night. But then I found that capsule the next morning and I thought, 'Cool! It's the dynocap Bulma's been looking for!' And I pushed the trigger and the next thing I know Puar and I are covered in leather lingerie and that...thing...is hanging from my ceiling fan."

Bulma winced. "Even if that's the case, Yamcha..."

He grimaced and ran his hand through his hair. "She just looked like a pretty girl at a bar. How was I supposed to know? Girls should come with a set of directions pinned to them or something."

He took her hands in his bigger, rougher ones. "I didn't cheat on you, Bulma. I've just been in a funk lately. I just don't know what's right or wrong anymore. Please forgive me."

"You brought her back to your place, Yamcha, and a man doesn't do that without intention," she snapped.

His expression darkened. "I wasn't the one who left her boyfriend at his own party!"

Bulma slipped her hands out of his and placed them on her hips. "I wasn't the one making muscles for girls while his girlfriend sat alone at the bar! You say that you invited her to your apartment so cavalierly. You know what, it honestly doesn't even matter. I think you're being genuine. Although you have had a bad attitude these last five months, I'll believe that she didn't wear that lingerie for you and you weren't excited by her phony domination act! But where did our own passion go? We've spent over ten years together and what do we have to show for it?"

"What-what are you saying, Bul-"

"These last few weeks, since I found that...capsule...I've had time to reevaluate and reflect on our relationship. And when I thought about our future together...I came up short. I don't think we're right for each other, Yamcha. I think that if we're honest with each other, that we would call it quits-"

"This isn't fair, Bulma! I had no idea you felt this way." "-although I am mad as hell that you would betray my friendship and trust like that, inviting a woman to your home the least of my frustrations with you, shutting me out of your life after you were revived-"

"You're just blowing off steam. Now who's the one being dishonest! You're just trying to punish me! Nothing unusual there!"

"I'm saying that I don't think we're compatible, Yamcha, and I think our relationship history repeatedly confirms that! I am not the girl for you! I make a crappy girlfriend to you! But I value our past, and I feel like refusing to let go would be immature of us. You can't tell me that you don't feel the same way, not when you've been acting like you don't even care if I exist!"

"I think that this is just like you, Bulma. Everything between us has had to be your way, even how we end it!"

"I never wanted it to be this way! It still needed to be said."

As the defeat creeped into his expression, she realized he had agreed on some level to her terms. It seemed totally quick and surreal, but it didn't feel wrong.

"Goodbye, Yamcha."

* * *

It all went wrong after Bulma had eight shots too many. The things right in front of her began to blur into meaningless shapes, and she was certain that her little black bikini was riding up too high somewhere, but she kept forgetting to check. Stars blanketed the sky thickly, spinning slowly. Although the city generated a lot of light pollution, the stars were still lustrous and she ran her fingers over them.

"If I had just one wish, I'd wish the moon back," Bulma sighed.

"You could gather the dragon balls and wish it back," a deep baritone rolled through the darkness. Bulma paused to consider. Piccolo floated a few yards in front of her, his cape billowing gently in the warm breeze that ruffled the pool water and bullied the trees into making hushing sounds as their leaves rubbed against each other.

"That's an idea," Bulma agreed.

"Go ahead and give her an idea like that. In the state she's in, she may never come back."

Bulma's head lolled to the side to face the newest intrusion.

"You guys are bickering like you're the angel and devil on my shoulder," she noted. "Piccolo would be the devil. Because he's the Demon King." She hiccuped. "That would make Vegeta my angel."

She thought she heard Piccolo snort somewhere.

"I'm here to inquire about Vegeta's power up today."

"It's none of your business, Namek."

"I make it my business to know your motives, regardless of your masquerading as an ally."

"If Kame could see you now," quipped Bulma, head lazing on her crossed arms.

Piccolo's eyes glanced her way and then locked onto Vegeta's.

"I refuse to play this game," he snapped.

"It's only a game if both participants are capable of being players."

"He was powering up for me," Bulma interjected through a thick tongue. "I made him these clothes that he looks so good in. I was making him try them on, and he was showing me how strong he is."

Someone choked somewhere. "That is not what happened at all."

"Have it your way."

"It was personal, then."

"It was nothing of the sort!"

"It was for my experiment. I made him do it. For my experiment. He was just obeying orders." She pumped her arm sarcastically. "That's all."

"I don't take orders from you."

"I'm trying to save your ass here!"

"I don't need to be saved!"

"There's no reason to be alarmed, then."

"No, Piccolo," she assured him choppily, sounding his name out. "It was just a test. And, boy, did he pass. With flying colors."

"That is enough, woman!"

"I see."

"It won't be happening again."

Bulma sat up abruptly and immediately regretted it. "Don't say that. What we had-ohhh, boy-what we had in there was special." She drifted forward, waiting for the sickness that was wreaking havoc to fade. When it became manageable, she stood up, wobbling and leaning against the chaise for support.

"Bulma, maybe you should let me find someone to help you into bed."

"Are you too chicken shit to do it yourself, Namek?"

Piccolo cast him a dirty look that Bulma was trying too hard not to fall down to see.

"No one invited you guys to this pity party, anyway," she complained.

"Why on Earth are you wearing heels?" Vegeta sounded closer.

Bulma straightened, ran her hair through her unruly blue mane and then balled her fists. "I just wanted to desirable!" She yelled at no one in particular.

"That was your cue, Prince."

Bulma rounded on them angrily. "I am tired of everyone thinking I need to be saved. I don't need you to treat me like I'm some princess in need of rescuing! I can save me by myself!" She waggled her finger furiously in what she thought was their direction. "I don't need help from you," she pointed at Piccolo's profile. "You," she pointed at the shadowed form of the Prince, his hands in his pockets. That casual mannerism was so rare from him that she had to look twice. "Or you!" The last one looked suspiciously like a bush.

"Let Vegeta help you, Bulma."

"Now I'm babysitting? Won't you let me keep even a scrap of pride?"

"Don't be afraid of him, Bulma. He's going to make sure you reach your room safely."

"He doesn't scare me," she retorted haughtily, sticking her tongue out in Vegeta's surprised face and listing sideways. "Maybe I should go lay down."

* * *

"I'm not mortified," Bulma reasoned with herself the next day. She was sipping her third cup of coffee, which was doing wonders for her hangover, as she hid from any flame haired or green antenna having aliens in her office. She opened the file that contained the data from yesterday's ki and vitals test. _It feels like days ago._ She wasn't sure if she should ask what happened after she blacked out. Although she had insisted on walking to her room on her own, she wasn't sure if she had made it there or not. All she knew is she had woken up in a cocoon of blankets with her bikini scrunched in all the wrong places. _Real mature. _If she hadn't dreamed them. It all seemed so fuzzy.

Her laptop compiled the results as she considered the uncertain direction her life was taking. She wasn't usually this concerned with her future, but she was nearing 30 with no career or significant other in sight. She was just totally confused by her role in life. Who was she supposed to be? What was she supposed to be doing?

This wasn't anyone else's problem but her own. She sighed. She had consistently shirked responsibility and discipline from her childhood on. Her parents, while doting, raised her liberally and bordering on negligent. She had never gone to school; instead, she spent her free time roaming the city and working on Capsule Corp projects with her father, who was content to share his fascination with science with his daughter. At best, she was a prodigy. At worst, she was a delinquent. After she had discovered the legend of the dragon balls from a book in her father's dusty library, she crafted the dragon ball radar and took off to scour the world, encountering a slew of strange places and new faces. It didn't take long until she was surrounded by martial artists, and for her life to revolve around their life experiences. She was entrenched. If she had nothing to proudly call her own, well, that was her fault.

The chirp from her laptop snapped her out of her reverie. She skimmed the numbers.

"It worked," she breathed, eyes scanning the rows of data. "It worked!" She jumped out of her chair, snatching hot papers out of the printer tray as they were spit out. She yanked out the final one before it had even been ejected and ran out the door.

"It worked!" She called as she ran across the lawn toward the GR, skipping every few strides. "It worked!" She hollered as she leapt up the walkway and pounded on the door. She was still pounding when it was jerked open, a very sweaty, grumpy Saiyan glaring at her.

"It worked!" She shrieked, shoving the papers in his face. "Woohoo!" She twirled around as he glanced at the data.

"What am I looked at," he groused, staring uncomprehending at the sheets of paper.

"The suit, you dweeb!" Vegeta growled at her but she didn't seem to notice, a grin splitting her face. She leaned over his arm, pointing at each set of data. "Your vitals were unaffected. I have to admit, I was a little worried they couldn't take the heat, but you Saiyans are really built like power houses. And now I have a loose average to reference if these numbers change."

"But that's not the best part," she rushed, flipping through papers over his forearms without realizing that she was pressed up against him as she searched the stack. He handed her the papers and took a step back, folding his arms over his chest.

She licked her fingers and flipped through each paper until she yanked one out of the stack, slamming it on top of the others. "There," she pointed.

His eyes searched the numbers briefly and he snapped, "What?"

"Your power level. It jumped 7,000 points."

Vegeta's face went slack. "What?

"The suit works with your energy to direct, enhance and even recycle energy as its created. Ki is usually sloppily used, until you channel it purposefully into an attack. Until you're holding a fully formed Galick Gun, Vegeta, a lot of the particles of energy you create, even when you power up or fly, just dissipate, for all you can tell disappearing unused. While you fight, each and every particle created taxes your system, used or not. All of these impossibly small particles and you're suddenly feeling tired and losing energy in mass amounts that could have been been harnessed during battle."

Vegeta's mind was whirling and it showed. He frowned down at the paper with discerning absorption.

"The suit works a little bit like a turbo does on a car. As you power up, you're building energy pressure that's contained by the fibers of this armor. Once maximum build up has occurred-at 25, 50, 75, and 100 percent, in this case-the suit releases the pressure for you to use. Only instead of it just pouring out of you, out of control, the suit checks it, allowing each and every particle to be used at will. That is, if my design holds up. Meaning you tire less quickly and can form bigger and better attacks."

Vegeta glanced up at her, scowling in consideration, although his face was unusually open. "But I'll be useless without the suit. Out of the training room, this does nothing for me."

"Not true. If you're smart, you will be able to pick up on the sensation of conserving your energy and train yourself to control and manipulate it incisively. That insight will increase your power level at a more rapid rate than physical exercise alone. And it's totally natural, Vegeta," she followed, softly. "This suit simply controls energy at the particle level. The rest of the work and reward is yours."

He stared at the papers in front of her until she began to grow uncertain. "How much can you estimate my power level to rise?"

"It's limitless, Vegeta. There is no ceiling. All we can do is see how far we can push it."

Vegeta wasn't familiar with acknowledging someone's kindness towards him or even comfortable with acknowledging his own emotions. So he chewed over his words until he issued solemnly, "I look forward to rising to the challenge."

Bulma could only agree.

* * *

Author's Note: Normally, I'm not a big fan of the whole making-a-monster-out of-Yamcha-while-martyring-Bulma thing. I think it's a useful device-definitely abundant-but I think it can be cheap, too. And let's all be honest-our girl Bulma can't be the easiest girlfriend to have. That's why we all like her, right? After careful consideration, I decided to leave Yamcha's "fickleness," as Toriyama put it, open ended. Whether or not Yamcha's guilty is up to you, but his guilt isn't the point; rather, Bulma's awakening is. I think it's just dandy that each Three Year Period author can bring their own interpretation to the table. Toriyama has, for better or worse, left a space big enough to fit all possibilities. And to be clear, I'm not interested in writing canon. My intent is to bring real life and real problems in to complicate and make real the DBZ landscape, and I tried to explore Bulma and Yamcha's dissolution fairly and in a way many of us can relate to.

Also, there had to be a really embarrassing, incriminating sex toy discovery. Leaving comedy out of their break up was out of the question. If it's not fun for me to write, how will it be fun for you to read?


	4. Hang Ups

Greetings, readers! Thanks to those of you who left kind reviews! Now I see why authors complain about reviewing. This story has gotten a totally disproportionate amount of visitors to reviews! It's unsettling because I don't know whether or not I'm doing a satisfactory job of this. Please, feel free to comment. I don't bite!

Although I don't want to spoil the surprise, I'd like to mention that this is the last chapter before we proceed to the main plot outside the romance between Bulma and Vegeta. You heard right. Outer space, here we come! I know many of you have been wondering where all the AU is that was spoken for in the summary. Well, it's just around the corner.

It's going to get steamy in here, folks.

Disclaimer: I don't own them. I've borrowed some of the original dialogue, as well.

__Hang Ups_

* * *

Data from Vegeta's use of her suit streamed to her laptop, bogging it down with numbers that consumed her until nightfall. Bulma monitored him from her office, stopping by the GR at the end of the day to report his progress after finishing work of her own. She had immersed herself in ki research and development. No sooner did she draw up a blueprint for a ki gun than she unlocked a compound to ki boost. She was on fire, and Vegeta was her totally unconcerned muse.

Vegeta ended his training around 11 each night to make a Saiyan-sized snack, and it quickly became routine for Bulma to join him for dinner at the door of the GR. Or intrude on his dinner. Either way, Vegeta seemed content to let her walk him to the house and yammer away while he shoved a day's worth of food into his mouth, occasionally interjecting.

At first she stuck to business, but Bulma found it hard to keep herself from chattering-a habit that wasn't exclusive to Vegeta-and their conversations soon dissolved into casual conjecture. At first, it was a little one sided; she was the one doing all the talking. That's when her suspicions were confirmed, as she watched him devour everything in sight, dodging her chit chat dourly. She was concerned Vegeta wasn't getting enough to eat. His body required more fuel to deal with the more intense training he was putting himself through, despite the suit's ability to conserve energy. Like everything else, he pushed the suit to its limits. So she ordered a fridge and six weeks worth of groceries stocked in the lower chamber of the gravity simulator at all times, and although he never acknowledged it, he looked better for it.

When it became evident Bulma wasn't going to quit pestering him, Vegeta slowly opened up about various technology he'd used in the past and the science of ki as he knew it from Frieza's army. It was a scientist's wet dream. She was totally new to conversations in which she could talk shop without reservations and throw an equal amount of banter around to boot. It was fresh and novel, and it thrilled her. And, unlike the other Z fighters, he seemed to welcome the exchange. With Vegeta, she wasn't slotted as an overbearing loud mouth or reduced to a trope. With him, she was free to be Bulma.

He fascinated her. On a good day, he was confident, saucy, and quick witted, contentedly teasing her in his minimal spare time. On a bad day, he was cruel and surly, complicated and uncompromising. Like an animal caught in a trap, he snapped suspiciously at anyone who tried to help him. She could see why the other fighters were wary of him. But even when all she could coax out of him was a disgruntled criticism of her gravity room, she couldn't back off. She couldn't help but to warm up to him.

After awhile, she trusted him to be receptive about her and her friend's adventures together. She fondly explained to him how she had met Goku and how the hunt for the dragon balls defined their adolescence.

He found it especially funny that their first wish with the dragon balls was a request for the world's most comfortable pair of underwear.

"Trust you and your friends to have all the power in the universe in your hands and fuck it up. Your friends are comedy gold, at least."

When she let it slip that she had once been turned into a carrot, he grinned brutishly and asked low, "So which one does it for you? The carrot or the frog?" His humor was dark and biting, and it delighted her that she was the recipient of it. With her friends, he was either aggressive or reserved. But with her, he maybe, just maybe, let his guard down and relaxed. And, for the first time in her life, she could reciprocate.

* * *

It was with their late evening bantering in mind that she decided to visit the Son family...bearing gifts.

"Yoohoo!" Bulma called inside the house as she knocked tentatively. She was an outspoken woman, but even ChiChi intimidated her.

"Oh, hey, Bulma!" Gohan shuffled stiffly to the door, admitting her in politely. "Mom's making lunch. Would you like to come in and eat?"

"If your mom doesn't mind me dropping by unannounced, I'm game, kid. But I'm actually here to see you and your father."

"What's up?" Goku called, rounding the corner. They must have just finished training. He had a towel around his neck, and his and Gohan's _gi_ were wet with sweat.

"Hi, Goku! It's been awhile!" She grinned foolishly, holding up a dynocap and twirling it back and forth. "I brought you guys something."

She moved into the cramped living room and popped the dynocap. There lay two orange and one purple _gi_, each with the owner's respective school insignia on the chest.

"Wow, what are these?"

"Well," drawled Bulma, happy to be discussing her small achievement, "these suits will boost your training, if you're interested in wearing them." Bulma had had the suits made for Goku, Piccolo and Gohan with the intention of helping them against the Androids in any way she could. They weren't, however, as advanced as Vegeta's. Bulma was possessive with their project, and she considered Vegeta's progress her own reward. She was just reluctant to share the unique, intensive experience of the more advanced suit with the others. Even though she may get an actual effusive thank you from the Sons, Vegeta's cooperation seemed more personal. So it followed that the tech for these suits was more crude and didn't require them to be monitored. To be fair, she wasn't sure the Sons-never mind Piccolo-would want to be intrusively monitored anyway.

She gave them a broad run down on the technology and watched as they suited up.

"Oh, yeah!" Goku exclaimed, running his hands over the fabric on his chest and punching the air. "I can feel it working already. It's like it's holding my ki back for me to use when I'm ready for it."

"That's about right, Goku! Boy, you're more enthusiastic than Vegeta was about it."

"Speaking of Vegeta, how are things getting along between you two?" Goku asked as disinterestedly as he could manage. Gohan glanced up, curiously. He knew first hand that the Prince wasn't easy to get along with.

"He hasn't exploded in a rage, if that's what you're asking." She chuckled. "Things have actually been pretty quiet around Capsule Corporation. He spends most of his time training. He's adjusting to life on Earth well enough, I think."

"He hasn't been friendly, though, I take it."

"Well, it depends on what you call friendly. He's pretty interesting if you catch him in a good mood."

Goku looked sidelong at her. "As long as there's no trouble."

Bulma didn't seem to realize she was smiling distractedly. "Not at all."

* * *

Bulma was proven wrong the following evening. It was silent and isolated down in her office, freeing Bulma to become fully absorbed in her work. Although she was used to a fast paced, sociable lifestyle, the solitude was fitting her lately.

It was about an hour before she usually left her office to join Vegeta for dinner. Or, just to eat dinner. She still wasn't really sure where they stood. She enjoyed his company and managing their project, and that was all she could ask for these days.

As Bulma laid her pencil down and bent over to reach for her set of alan wrenches, she felt the hair on the back of her neck rise and looked up.

The silhouette of the Saiyan loomed in the doorway.

"Yes?" Bulma asked with way more control than she felt.

Vegeta's gaze raked over her face before his cold expression settled again.

Finally, he spoke. "Why does that third class and his son have suits like mine?" It was a poorly disguised threat, and it carried throughout the room.

Bulma stared at him, baffled. "Because...I thought...they'd like some?"

Vegeta's hands fisted at his sides, his posture rigid. Alarm began to course through her.

"Vegeta?" She asked tentatively.

"I don't want you helping those clowns! This tech is between you and me."

She dropped her wrench set on the desk, stunned.

"Why not help them prepare for the androids, too? We all benefit-"

"Damnet," he roared, ki exploding around him. "Why do you have to be so generous!"

_This is what you get for playing with fire, Bulma, you idiot!_

"And why are you wearing that fucking scouter?" His ki surged around him, but just as quickly, he extinguished it. Cutting the air with his hand, he demanded gravely, "I don't want you helping anyone else. Just me."

Bulma finally regained her backbone and stood up.

"You can't tell me what I can and can't do!"

"If you want my help against those tin cans, you will!"

"You don't have the right to give me an ultimatum!"

"Why not? You do it to Scarface all the time!"

"Well, you're not my boyfriend!"

He growled, taking a step toward her. "You won't be helping those weaklings anymore."

"Goku is my oldest friend, Vegeta. I would be betraying him by refusing to help, in spite of everything that he's done selflessly and out of the goodness of his heart!"

"Everything he's done 'selflessly' has been anything but, woman. It's his Saiyan need to conquer every challenge. It's a primal call in the blood and no more. Quit glorifying him! And I'm not just talking about the third class. It includes Scarface, too."

"What?" Bulma leaned forward until their noses were almost touching. "How dare you! If you think you're going to scare me into compliance, you're dead wrong!"

Before she could blink, he had her pinned to the desk, his thick arms caging her while his eyes blazed down on her.

"I dare, Onna," he murmured against her lips.

His body was hot against her. Lust bolted through her. She steeled herself for fury, but instead got tenderness. His fingers gently gripped the hair at the nape of her neck as his lips closed around her pulse. Bulma's eyes rolled back in her head as his mouth roamed her neck, and her intention of putting him in his place became foggy. His nearness made him as mesmerizing as a snake charmer.

Everything between them seemed to lead to this, Bulma realized as she quickly lost her connection to reality. On Namek, Vegeta had taken his anger out on everyone else but her. In the clearing where they had been deposited after Namek, she had called him cute and he-the Prince of all Saiyans-had blushed. She had wondered out loud how to save his enemies, and he had answered her. She had dreamt him coming back to Earth and kissing her, to Yamcha's dismay, and when he finally arrived, she had insulted him and demanded he take a shower...and he obeyed her. A defiant, ruthless fighter...and here he was, out of all places in the universe a powerful Prince could be, and he was pressed against her, lowering his mouth to hers as his hand cupped the back of her head.

Their lips met softly, their mouths parted. He kissed her again, and this time his tongue darted out to meet hers, pressing against hers heatedly. His hand pulled away from the back of her neck, and she felt his fingertips brush against her collar and push her lab coat gently off her shoulders. She broke out into goosebumps. Her fingers wove into his thick hair as she kissed him back eagerly, cupping his sharp jaw and urging him deeper into her mouth.

He liked her! That was the only explanation! Bulma's head swam with the revelation. It didn't help that he was kissing his way down her belly and deftly unbuttoning her shorts while her head hung back between her shoulders, spinning. Did he know? Did he realize? Was he in denial, or was he playing some sort of cruel joke? Did he just want her for a quick fling or was he interested in more? No, the Vegeta she knew wouldn't have given her the privilege of his company if he was interested in only a one time thing.

Vegeta pulled away. She raised her heavy eyelids.

"What's wrong?" She swallowed her words before she finished speaking them. He was looking at her wildly. His hands moved up her cheek and she felt him remove something hooked from her ear. She glanced at it and remembered she had been wearing the scouter. Their eyes met again.

Vegeta's penetrative stare drug her somewhere primal and abysmal, somewhere she wasn't sure she could float. The taste of his mouth was in her mouth, her lips swollen and wet from their kiss, and that fact sent her over the edge. She burst into flames.

She grabbed his powerful neck and kissed him deeply, and his hands tangled up in her hair. His palms swept down her arms, pulling her to closer him as he kissed her blisteringly. She sucked at his neck, leaving bruises. Her smooth legs kept rubbing up against his thighs and it was driving him crazy. He scooped her up and laid her down on the desk, his mouth on her throat and his hands all over her thighs. She couldn't get enough of him, couldn't stand his shirt between them, and she tugged at the hem. In one swift move, he straightened and pulled it off his body. She suppressed a giddy gasp.

Suddenly his lips were on her stomach and he was pulling her shirt up, his hot mouth following behind. He ran his hands up her belly and cupped her breasts, nipping at them through the fabric of her tank with no bra between them. _Oh, I am so glad I was too lazy to get properly dressed today._ He pulled her shirt over her head, and she arched back as he covered her bare chest with his mouth.

His hand made its way down to the inside of her thigh, and her stomach clenched with his proximity. He hooked his fingers in the crotch of her shorts, rubbing his knuckles against her lips gently. She jolted and moaned and peered under her eyelids. He was smirking up at her. Grabbing her underwear at her hips in his thick hands, he slowly pulled them off her, her legs cocked together against him. He smirked and lowered himself to his knees before her. He gripped her behind her knees and pushed her thighs apart, and she watched him lower his lashes, going in for the kill.

She felt his tongue on her core like a shock. The difference between his hot mouth and her cool lab pimpled her skin and puckered her nipples. Her head lolled back again as he laved at her, kneading her thighs and running his fingernails lightly on the soft insides of them. She felt a finger test her as he sucked at her lips, and then it plunged in. Bulma inhaled sharply and bucked her hips. He gripped a thigh with one hand and tested two fingers with the other, and she rested her feet on his shoulders so she could thrust into his mouth and fingers.

She felt him chuckle, vibrating her core. "Heels, again?" She glanced down and noticed her heels digging into his powerful shoulders. He didn't seem to mind, considering his answer was to lick up her, hard, while his fingers curved to find her sweet spot.

If he really liked her...she could persuade him to let her continue helping Goku and Gohan. Right? And she could send a message before anything serious developed between them. Bulma Briefs would not be tread on! Especially when it came to an obstinate, cocky Saiyan. And what better time to tell him than when she held the upper hand?

She was quickly losing control. She looked at him through heavy lids. Now was as good a time as ever to let him know she was her own boss, right?

"I'm serious, Vegeta."

Her voice came out much more of a purr that she had wanted it to.

His hands ran up her belly and his thumbs flicked her nipples as his tongue lapped at her. Her eyes rolled back in her head. Evidently she had to try and be firmer.

"I'm going to help them. They deserve it as much as you do," she gritted out.

He growled against her, filling his palms with her ass and then scooping her up and pinning her upright against the wall. The wall was cold on her back, but the complaint soon left her head as he pressed his thick erection against her, all that divided them a think layer of lycra. She sucked in her breath as he grinded against her. Her breasts were heavy as he filled his hands with them, his mouth against her jaw. She clutched him, sinking her fingernails into him and moaning. If she was going to prove a point and take a stand, she better do it now, before she became completely incomprehensible and ended up with the short end of the deal.

"What's...the big deal...anyway? You have the better suit, this just levels the playing field between you two-"

No sooner had she said it than she fell with a hard thump onto her desk. She sat there in confusion with her legs sprawled open until she saw he was walking out the door. She panicked. Where was her lab coat? She was stark naked and there was no way she was intercepting him in just heels.

"Vegeta, wait!" She called, buttoning herself up as she stumbled into the corridor. He halted, turning his head to the side.

Now that she had his attention, she could afford to be angry. She balled up her fists and railed. "What's the big idea, you jerk! What's wrong with you?"

He turned toward her. Oh, Kame, he looked mad. Bulma faltered for a second.

"You're what's wrong!" He roared back.

"What? There's nothing wrong with me! You're the one who doesn't know how to treat a lady!"

"You had no complaints a moment ago!"

Bulma's face heated. "Is this about helping Goku? You don't know when to let go!"

"And you don't know when to shut up!"

She gasped indignantly. "What? You're the one who broke into my lab demanding I quit protecting you all from dying in three years! You can't control everything, you know!"

Vegeta stalked towards her, ripping a picture frame off the wall as he stalked towards her. It was a photograph of Bulma sandwiched between Yamcha and Goku during the last martial arts tournament, Puar perched on Yamcha's shoulder and grins splitting their faces. He came to a halt in front of her.

"I am _not_ one of your Z Fighters, some damned superhero sidekick to Kakarot. I will not ever be the idiot smiling beside you. _I_ am the villain. And I am not one of your pets! It took every trick your precious Goku had to exhaust me, and even then, your Z warriors had to hack off my tail, throw a "spirit bomb" at me and then accidentally crush me just to get me off the planet." His voice was gravel, scraping. "It was a goddamned fluke that your precious Goku beat Frieza! I can not be tamed, trained, reformed like some damned circus monkey! I don't need anyone's help to take down those tin cans, certainly not some spoiled brats and absolutely not Kakarot's!" He marched back down the hallway, throwing the picture down angrily in disgust.

"You are so unbelievably bitter. Just accept that you can't do everything on your own!"

"Your concern isn't going to win you any medals," he scoffed.

"There are no games of life or death to play between us, Vegeta-"

"There is always a fight, you win or you lose-"

"No one is asking you to act this way anymore!"

"This is who I am. The fight is everything to me!"

"Your stubbornness is imparing your judgment!"

"I am a Saiyan Elite, and I don't need anybody!" He bellowed, ki igniting around him.

And then he was gone.

* * *

Bulma stood naked in front of the bathroom mirror. She ran her hands down her silhouette and then over her eyes. She made a face at herself in the mirror and turned away.

She was miserable. She hadn't spoken to Vegeta in weeks. He had, so conveniently, moved into the ship. He didn't show up for expecting to be fed anymore, and he had abandoned their project. Bulma's heart sunk when she checked the suit data the day after their argument, and there was nothing to report. He was proving to her that his obstinacy would win a battle with her pride any day.

And he was right. Without his company or his help with their project, she was listless. She laid in bed all day. She didn't work. She hadn't been down to her office since she read the empty print out. If he had rejected power to make a point, she imagined he was well and truly done with her. Her usual past times or her personal time were empty. She was a mess. Without Vegeta, she felt like she had no purpose. She had relied on a man for satisfaction and wound up right back where she started.

In order to cheer herself up, she had taken herself shopping. She zipped up her new heeled boots, adjusted her boobs, and then staring into the mirror.

"You look foxy," she encouraged herself, raising her thumbs. She sighed. Alright, she'd admit it-she had moped about for weeks. Although she was hurt and furious with the things he'd said that night-oh, Kame, the things that had happened that night-she had hoped things would return to normal. She had expected him to be aloof or short with her the next day. Maybe they'd even have another, smaller argument that would tidy up the mess. Instead, he had disappeared. The GR still ran at the usual times, so she knew he hadn't taken off, but he didn't come in to eat and he hadn't returned to his room. He was hiding out in the GR.

At first, she'd accepted the challenge. She would wait him out. He'd get over it. He liked her, didn't he? Waiting for him to get over it had made her defiant. If he wanted war, he'd have war! But now she was just miserable. She was losing the battle. The only thing she had gained that night was his shirt, thrown carelessly onto a file cabinet, that she now kept stuffed in her night stand.

"What is wrong with me?" She cried out to her reflection, pulling at her hair. She hadn't seen him in a month! Four weeks of tortuously long, boring days and unresolved frustrations. She couldn't believe his discipline. And he was either rubbing his hands together gleefully- probably still scowling-knowing his time tested pride would outlast her stubbornness...or she really had misjudged him. Maybe he didn't really have feelings for her. Maybe she should have been more tactful about what she said. Although he could dish it out, a man with enormous pride like that would find it hard to listen to some constructive criticism.

Whoever's fault it was, all this angst and grief on her end could only mean one thing...

"I like him!" Bulma stared at herself apprehensively, her hands flattened on her cheeks.

And it was with that realization that Yamcha knocked on her bedroom door.

"Oh, hi," Bulma croaked after opening the door.

"Hi," Yamcha smiled at her shyly. He had cut his hair and was wearing his gi, the orange complimenting his tanned skin. He was as handsome as ever. Bulma warmed up when he smiled at her, and she smiled back.

"I'm sorry to just drop in on you like this, but I wanted to come by and say goodbye before I left for training. Your mom let me in on her way to feed the pets."

"So that means you're done with the playoffs. How did you guys do?" She asked him, sincerely.

He straightened with pride. "We took second place."

"That's great! Congratulations!"

"Yeah," he said, smiling at the ground. He looked back up at her, suddenly serious. "Bulma, I just wanted to apologize. I didn't treat you right these last few months. You were right. I was running away from my feelings after I was revived. I thought I was running from the problem, but it turned out I was just as miserable living like that."

Bulma softened. "Yamcha, I'm just as to blame as you are. Don't hold it against yourself. People make mistakes."

Yamcha placed his big warm hand on her shoulder. The intimate gesture shocked her. She had a good idea of what he was about to say, and dread filled her. She wasn't sure if today of all days she would be strong enough to resist.

"I just wanted to say I'm sorry. I'm going to the Wastes to train and I'd be happy if you went to dinner with me when I get back. It would mean a lot to me if I could make it up to you."

"Yamcha," she breathed, "I-"

They were hit with a wall of concussive air, and a boom ripped through the grounds. Her things were tossed and thrown around the room as Bulma and Yamcha held tightly onto the door frame, the explosion savaging their ears. Just as quickly, it became silent.

They stared at each other. "What was that?" Yamcha asked, eyes wide.

"I don't-" Reality ripped through her. "Vegeta," she gasped, tearing down the stairs and across the house.

"Vegeta!" She called as she tore across the lawn. She stumbled when she saw the rubble that was the GR. How could anyone survive this? She sunk to her knees.

"I knew this would happen! He's been trying to do the impossible!" Yamcha accused, eyes scanning the wreckage.

"Where is he? Vegeta?" She called tentatively, uncertain she'd get an answer back as she dumbly moved some rubble, crawling towards the center of the wreckage. She shrieked as a hand shot out in front of her and stumbled back into Yamcha. The hand clutched at the air, and then Vegeta pushed himself out of the rubble, groaning. They gaped.

"You...okay?" Bulma managed.

"Of course I am," Vegeta ground out, painfully getting to his feet.

Bulma let out a breath she didn't know she had been holding. Suddenly, she was spitting mad.

"How dare you, you dweeb! You almost wrecked my house! What are you trying to prove?"

Vegeta stood, hinged at the waist, breathing heavily. He was covered in a motley of bruises and gashes, and it looked like his chest had taken most of the damage. He tried to stand and fell backwards, spraying rubble. A bolt bounced past her.

"What? Oh, no! You're hurt!" She ran to him, kneeling beside him. She helped him sit up, clutching his shoulder with a hand on his chest.

"Go. I don't need help," he grit out.

"You've got to stop training for awhile. I mean, look at you! You're a complete wreck!" She pled.

He looked up at her through swollen eyelids. "But I feel fine! I'm a Saiyan. I can take a little pain. It means nothing to me. And I have to get stronger than Kakarot!"

His almost childish plea weakened her temper. "Ok, look, we all know you're a tough guy, but you need to rest now." Yamcha stood up and stared at their exchange.

"I take orders from no one!" Vegeta ground out, shaking her off as he tried to stand. He fell back, losing consciousness. She leapt over to him and crouched beside him, adjusting him more comfortably with his head in her lap.

"Yamcha, go get help!"

Yamcha stood staring for another second and then walked stiffly towards the house.

* * *

She stepped out of Vegeta's room and shut the door quietly. Her father's small medical team, which he kept on retainer at CC headquarters, had arrived to the Briefs' home quickly. After they okayed his vital signs, they suggested Bulma get him into a bed to recover. She had followed them on their heels, buzzing around on the edges as they bandaged him and hooked him up to an IV and an oxygen tank. When the medical team relinquished him to the Briefs care, Bulma had hovered over him after her parents had left, overcome with worry. She figured the prognosis had to be bad if the Saiyan was knocked out, and even worse after they informed her it would take at least a week for him to recover. She had seen his resilience in battle, and with one look at his pallid condition, she feared the worst.

She found Yamcha pacing by the breakfast bar. He saw her approach and came to a halt. He looked furious. She froze, startled.

"What's wrong?" She barely finished the sentence before he cut her off.

"What's wrong?" He snorted. His words came out fast, incensed and clipped. "What's wrong? Don't lie to me, Bulma. I see through you. You like him."

"Huh?" She tensed.

"Him!" Yamcha thrust his finger towards the stairs. "It's written all over your face. Fussing over him like you're his girlfriend. Have you guys been together this whole time?"

Bulma's jaw dropped. "No," she denied. "Why would you say that-"

"How could you, Bulma, he's a world class ass, and he _killed_ me!" "

Yamcha was pacing frantically again, jabbing his finger in the air with every point he made. "And you accuse me of being neglectful? I would be a better choice than him every time! How can you trust someone so selfish with your emotions? He's a sociopath, Bulma. He's gonna get what he wants from you," he spewed, "and then he's gonna _bail_!"

What could she say? Yes, she did like him. It was all true. Yes, she wanted to pursue that desire. She desired a murderer. She liked her boyfriend's murderer. She liked a murderer who could never like her back. What was wrong with her?

"I can't believe I came over here to..." Yamcha continued, running his hands through his hair.

He pivoted and marched out of the house, slamming the door behind him.

Bulma stood stiffly, staring at the front door. She felt a tear slip down her cheek. She took a wracking breath, her hands fisted, and fought back offended tears.

* * *

"Honey, how else would anyone have reacted?" Her mother rubbed her back and then directed her toward a kitchen chair, pouring her a cup of tea. "He yelled at you and left you to clean up the mess. But don't blame Yamcha, honey, he's adjusting to a life without you. One where the girl he's grown up loving doesn't need him."

"I should have defended myself, Mom." Bulma said rawly. He eyes were irritated and red but her breathing was calm. "I should have taken the bait and fought back. Why couldn't I?"

"Honey, no one expects you to apologize for Vegeta. At least I don't. That's not your responsibility. But acknowledging your feelings is."

Bulma peered over her cup at her. "I...I don't know what to do. Yamcha's right. I like someone who doesn't know how to be in a healthy relationship of any kind. If he's been in one at all. I've gotten myself in over my head. I can't change him." She plunked her cup in front of her. "But I can't change how I feel," she finished miserably.

Mrs. Briefs rubbed Bulma's hand. "It will work itself out in time. That's all you can do, dear, is wait for him to adjust to his feelings."

"Mom, you talk about him like he knows. He doesn't," Bulma whispered, pale. "He's not aware of any of this." She waved her hand wildly in the air.

"I can't imagine that you would feel something for someone who wasn't responding back to you."

Bulma paused, considering. "I thought he did...like me. I thought he did and banked on it, and I screwed up," she finished dolefully. "He didn't do what I thought he would. I should have expected him to be unpredictable, but I was too proud to consider his feelings. He locked himself in the GR with everything he needs to prove to me he doesn't need me. My help...my feelings."

"He shut himself away from your feelings or his?" His mother suggested, gently. "You may be right. There is a player in this game who hasn't been consulted yet. And it's only fair to you both if you make your intentions clear."

"Intentions?" She whispered to herself. "I mean, am I really gonna act on it?" She gazed into her tea with wonder.

"You already have," Bunny informed her. "You let him into your home and heart. It's plain to see, even to Yamcha. And I know you. You can't sit quietly. You always have to play the game out."

"Game," Bulma murmured. "A game of emotions...Games, strategy and battles are the only thing Vegeta understands. How do I win a battle against him?" Her head drooped into her hand and she stared out the big dining room windows. "I don't know if I can win this game."

* * *

She hadn't slept well in days. She gave a defeated sigh, threw the covers off of herself and headed toward the shower. After she dressed, she crept down the hall into Vegeta's room. It was early in the morning, and she had to scoot close to get a good look at him in the pale gray light. He still lay rigidly on his bed, his breath even, his brows furrowed. _Even while asleep, he can't relax._ She crouched next to him, the oxygen hissing softly and the monitor interlocuting quietly. She reached slowly out to him, frowning in concern. When her skin met his, she flinched, but he didn't budge. She gathered her willpower and wrapped her hand around his, watching his chest rise and fall. She listened to him breathe until the dull light of early morning brightened and washed everything in the room white. She felt calmer and more relaxed while listening to the rhythm of his breathing. She ran the back of her fingers over his strong, angled cheek.

"Get better, Vegeta," she encouraged softly, placing her hand on his bandaged chest. "You're too much of a bastard to let this knock you down." She smiled. Standing up, she walked over to the window and cracked it. It was finally beginning to cool down, summer slowly winding to a close, and a velvety, cool breeze wafted in. Bulma walked over to the desk and sat down, laying her head on her arms and letting the din of her chaotic thoughts and the white noise of her worry wash over her until she fell asleep.

She woke up with drool wetting her sleeve. She wiped her mouth and glanced at the bed. He didn't seem to have moved. She tiptoed out.

Bulma ran into her father in the hallway.

"Bulma, dear," her father greeted her, characteristically puffing on a cigarette. "After they clean up that mess out back, do you think I aught to have the secondary ship placed on the lawn? That way we won't have to waste time replacing our first one when the boy's ready to get back to training."

She didn't know whether to frown or sigh hopefully. Vegeta would probably be insisting on getting right back to work as soon as he recovered. She wouldn't be surprised if they had to restrain him to keep him from his stupid, grueling obsession.

"That's probably a good idea, Dad," she remarked.

"Alright, dear. But there's something else I wanted to speak to you about. Just what do you think caused Number Four to explode?"

Bulma frowned and laughed sarcastically. "Vegeta's damned mulishness? Knowing him, he probably got pissed and shot right through the walls, despite knowing it would damage the ship."

"I think there's something strange about that explosion. There's no blast hole. The ship blew apart like an egg in a microwave. It's as if the whole damn thing couldn't contain the pressure."

She blanched. "Dad, you don't think this is our fault, do you?"

He dragged on his cigarette, contemplating. "I don't think an energy blast is what caused the damage. Basic physics, you know. Pressure had to have built up quick from inside and violently sought relief. Just an idea, dear."

She watched her father shuffle away, his hands behind his back. Vegeta couldn't have turned the gravity up too high and blown the place to bits. The engine would have simply gave up if that were the case. There were no explosive materials on that ship; the fuel had been siphoned off early on. A ki blast might have penetrated the walls of the ship and ripped a hole in the walls, but it wouldn't have caused fragmentation like that. Energy had to rapidly increase and expand outward to generate an explosion on that level...kind of like a quick and forceful power up...

"He's been using the suit," she breathed, realization dawning on her. "He deactivated the diodes!"

She ran downstairs, down into the lower level hallway and swept into her lab. She forced the laptop open and mashed the power button, impatiently drumming her fingers. As soon as it had finished starting up, she clicked the button for the suit frenetically, until the result files filled the screen.

Weeks worth of unregulated, unobserved data filled the screen.

"He disconnected the fucking connection," she growled. "He disabled the fucking diodes so that I couldn't observe him, but it didn't stop the diodes from recording him."

She was livid and getting more so by the second. She mashed the print button and ripped the paper from the printer, marching upstairs. Her teeth gnashed together. She was so mad she couldn't speak, but she had the feeling that if she started yelling, she wouldn't be able to stop.

She swung Vegeta's door open, fist clenching the paper.

The bed was empty, the oxygen mask and IV discarded.

Something caught her eye, and she glanced toward the window, where the curtain rippled with the breeze. She marched over and jerked the curtain up.

The window was opened wide.

"Vegeta!" She screamed, already headed downstairs. She strode across the lawn, toward the fresh replacement ship that already clanged and glowed.

How could he? How could he just so easily disregard the help they were trying to give him after a serious injury? He took and he took and he took and he never gave back!

Bulma yanked the wires out of the exterior power box. The whirr of the engine immediately lost power. It only took her a few steps to reach the door and yank it open. Sure enough, she found him, quivering in a push up position, bandages hanging off him.

"You've been using the suit behind my back!" She accused, throwing the crumpled paper at him as she stood in the doorway. "That's why the ship exploded! Because you were too much of a world class ass to let me help you!"

He continued doing jerky push ups as though he hadn't heard her, grunting painfully through each one.

"You are in NO condition to be doing this right now!" She yelled, marching towards him. "I know you don't want to believe it, but you _are_ made of flesh and blood!"

He growled, flipping clumsily up into a standing one armed push up before he collapsed onto the floor.

Her arms crossed. "Nothing to say? Because you know I'm right. Go back to bed and get some rest," she ordered through clenched teeth.

"I do have something to say," he informed her wearily, struggling to look at her.

Her arms fell to her sides as she considered him with concern. He was shaking and bleeding again. She knelt beside him.

"What is it? Is something wrong?" Her eyebrow went up, and she smirked wildly. "Or maybe you'd like to apologize to me? If so, let's hear it."

He met her gaze, and his face was a mask of cold fury. "Get out!" He barked into her face. She lost her balance and fell onto her rear end as he struggled to stand and confront her.

"I don't want your help, your concern, or your interest in me! I just want you to _leave me alone!" _He seethed, and his ki exploded around him, framing him in icy blue flames. _"_Leave me _alone!"_

She crab crawled backwards until she hit the wall, climbing to her feet with her back against the doorframe as the wind of ki buffeted at her. She stood her ground, squinting, until a wall of concussive air threw her out of the door and skidding down the ramp, slamming the door after her.

She sat sprawled out in the grass, gawking like an idiot. Bulma picked herself up and walked sorely across the lawn. Without seeing what was in front of her, she eventually found her father in his office, puffing on his cigarette as he stared down at a mess of paperwork.

She stared at him grimly.

"Dad, I have an offer for you."


	5. Gimme Space

Disclaimer: I don't own it.

__Gimme Space_

Another stack of papers dropped onto her desk.

"Well, that's all of them," the intern sighed, brushing her hands off against each other.

Bulma smiled weakly. "Thanks, Mindy."

"No problem, Ms. Briefs. It's six o'clock on a Friday night. Don't you have somewhere better to be?" She laughed, walking out Bulma's office door and grabbing her coat and purse at her desk before calling goodbye to the remaining staff.

"Nope. Not really," Bulma deadpanned. She sighed. She could either get through her current stack of research proposals and equipment requests and be home by ten, or she could clear her desk and be home by 2 a.m. She had drunk enough coffee to stay up all night, all she needed was the patience. And as wiped out as she felt lately, she found it hard to have the patience for much of anything. Well, if she was going to be here all night, she needed a distraction. Bulma grabbed some quarters out of her desk drawer and weaved her way around the office and into the small vending room.

She was deciding between cookies or chips when she felt someone behind her. She glanced over her shoulder and smiled politely. "Hello."

"Hey," her coworker smiled bashfully, jingling the quarters in his hand. He smiled to himself as he inspected the vending machines. He held his briefcase in his other hand, his wool coat thrown over his arm.

"Leaving?" Bulma asked quietly, still smiling. She hadn't spoken to him much, or anyone for that matter, since she had been hired at the Capsule Corporation Headquarters months ago. He was a key figure in Research and Development, so she had sat through many meetings with him, but all she knew about him was that he was a bright guy with a shy, infectious smile.

"Oh, yeah." He chuckled. "I, um, actually," he looked down at his change, "this is an alibi for me to come in here and talk with you." He pocketed his quarters and shifted his coat and briefcase. "I was just, uh, wondering if you'd like to go get coffee sometime."

Bulma smiled bittersweetly. "I'm sorry, I kind of just got out of a relationship."

His face turned solemn, but he pressed on. "Oh, yeah, with that baseball player?"

Bulma's face fell.

"I'm sorry, I don't know what's wrong with me. I shouldn't have brought him up." He looked up from under his messy, side parted hair and smiled once more. "Well, I did, too. Got out of a serious relationship, that is. But that's an even better reason to go, don't you think? We both need to get out and think about something else besides our personal lives. It would be good for us to have fun. It doesn't have to be anything more than that," he reassured her, smiling and leaning against the vending machine. At Bulma's silence, he faltered. "I'm sorry, I'm being presumptuous-"

"No," interrupted Bulma. "You are exactly right. I need to get out and talk to somebody new just for the pleasure of it. I'd be happy to have coffee with you. Are you free tomorrow night?

"Yeah! Yeah, I am." He beamed at the ground.

She wanted to brush his hair out of his eyes. She wanted him to be brave enough to look her dead in the eyes when he asked her out. She wanted him to smirk darkly, press her up against the vending machine and call her "Onna."

"Pick me up at 6:30 at the Capsule Corp home?"

He nodded, rewarding her with a smile. "See you then."

She watched him walk out of the office and then turned back to the vending machines. She frowned.

"Cheetos it is," she muttered distastefully.

* * *

"These fries are really something else."

"Yeah. They fry them in peanut oil. That's what makes them so crispy or something."

"Oh. Wow."

Bulma bit into her burger with relish. He had brought her to a small but well liked bistro in the center of the sprawling West City metropolis for their second meet-up. A small, recessed candle glowed between them as snow fell silently outside their window.

"It's just so good! Ugh! Even their pickles are amazing!" She gushed, talking through a mouthful of haute American cuisine.

"They pickle them here and everything," he agreed, wiping up the crumbs from his plate with his last bite. "I did good, then?"

She smiled sincerely at him. "You did fine. It's nice to be out and about. I can't remember the last time I did something like this."

"I don't want to sound like a stalker," he admitted, sipping his wine and leveling a quick smile at her, "but the media has always portrayed you as a socialite. Is that not true?"

"Well, I suppose it was, partly." She wiped her hands on her thick cloth napkin and shifted her plate to the side of the table. She sipped her red wine and then placed her hands on her knees. "I used to be more of a social butterfly, I guess. More outgoing and affable. I guess I've just grown up."

"I hope you don't mind me asking," he began in his soft tenor, "but since we're on the topic of 'growing up.' Why did you make your position at Capsule Corporation official? From what I understand, you already did a lot of under the table work that motivated big projects for our department to take on. And you're an heiress. You've got it 'made,' right? There's no reason for you to work a 9 to 5."

Bulma paused, considering how to keep the conversation light.

"Well, I have always been an armchair scientist." She chuckled. "In the same way that there are armchair philosophers. I mean, I wasn't an amateur in the same way someone casually remarking on philosophy would be, but our levels of commitment are the same. Anyway. I helped my father with projects for the pleasure of it. I've always had a passion for science. And I guess it's true that I was enough of an heiress that I never considered the direction of my life or making a life for myself. I just kind of plowed right along."

She stumbled over her next words, but he didn't seem to notice. "I was going through a rough time in my life. I was having that late twenties crisis," she laughed hollowly. "And that's when I resolved to take my life into my own hands. So I asked my Father for a position at Capsule Corporation." On condition. She no longer, under any circumstances, worked on the Gravity Room. And because he cared about his daughter's happiness, he had agreed to her terms.

"And did he welcome it?" He turned to exchange words with their waiter, pointing at their empty wine bottle, and then turned his attention back to Bulma.

She fluffed her hair, looking sightlessly over his shoulder. "Oh, well, my father's a little bit of an absent minded professor. He simply asked me what I wanted to do within the company, to which I replied something like, 'Anything, so long as it gets me out of here.' He thought Research and Development would be a good fit for me. Naturally, I would be an asset, with my gift for engineering. He only insisted I work from the ground up, to get a taste of the business world, before plunging right in. Which he knows I'm apt to do. Which was fair."

"You have greater ambitions?" He smiled slyly. "I'm not sure pushing papers is what I want to do with my life."

She managed to smile before her mouth could tighten into a thin line. "Yes. I have great expectations," she enunciated loftily, smirking. "I would like to see Capsule Corp transformed from a think tank into an industrial giant. And I'd like to see that the Briefs remain more than just a figurehead."

"So that's why you're always working so late," he laughed, plucking his cigarette pack out of his pocket and shaking one loose. "Would you like one?"

"Um, sure. I haven't smoked for a long time," she remarked quietly as she leaned in close to him so he could light the cigarette that hung between her lips. "My father and I used to smoke while we were working on big projects together."

She leaned back, her expression solemn. "I love engineering and I love the department," she continued, "but I do have corporate aspirations. I'm sure my dad could get me the job if I asked, but I wanted the reward of working my way to the top." The contours of her face softened. "And the extra work to take up my spare time. I'm a bit of a masochist, here."

"Deliberately asking for more work? I would say so," he laughed. "Nah, you're just a go getter. I"m sorry if this sounds presumptuous, but...well, it just seems like you're on top of the world. Your family is sitting on a fortune, you're extremely bright, and you're a world class beauty. Why would you even deign to lower yourself to a bunch of low brow intellectuals like the RD department?" He chuckled, snuffing out his cigarette in the ashtray.

"I would hardly call myself an intellectual," she dismissed. His compliments made her uncomfortable. It wasn't that they were insincere, but after the blowout with Yamcha and Vegeta...She wasn't just seeking her own worth in order to prove to them she didn't need them. She was, rather, convinced their abandonment of her was an indication that she wasn't worth sticking around for. Her self esteem had suffered, and here was this face in the crowd, telling her she was everything worth desiring.

"Sometimes it helps get to get out and bounce your emotions off of people," she remarked to herself.

"Well, since this conversation is already heavy, why don't we get our breakups out of the way. I'll go first," he offered, straightening in his chair.

Bulma's lips thinned. "Okay," she agreed finally.

"My ex let me know one night after a long day at work that she found me boring and unattractive and she had found another man who wasn't. She packed up her clothes, took our cats and walked out on our life. It's safe to say I'm a little wary of women now," he flashed her a small smile that Bulma couldn't help but think was chock full of self loathing.

"And yet you're here with me," Bulma retorted, before she could stop herself.

"Yeah, but you're amazing. You're worth getting nervous over," he smiled bashfully into his wine glass.

Bulma stared. "Oh. Well," she cleared her throat.

"Now it's your turn. Don't you just want to get it off your chest?"

"Um." Her mouth was dry and her hands fidgeted in her lap. "Sure. Well, Yamcha and I...we outgrew each other. We were the equivalent of high school sweethearts, I guess, except neither of us went to high school. We spent a lot of time together, and then we just slowly became...disengaged from each other's lives. Disinterested." She shrugged. "It ended."

"In a fiery blaze?" He asked, his eyes wide and comical as he wiggled his fingers dramatically.

She remembered blue fire licking steel. "Something like that." She drew inward.

"Is that the tough time you were speaking of?" He asked gently, sensing her reluctance.

"Yes." Her thoughts listed back and forth. She felt on edge, undecided. "No. I was-involved with someone else after him. He...It didn't end peaceably."

Bulma hadn't spoken about Vegeta since the day she had proposed to her father that she be hired on the Research and Development team. She had stuffed it down deep inside and plowed forward in a new direction, giving it no thought, no quarter. Now it was like she was summoning it, a chimera of emotion and circumstance that threatened her self assurance. It burbled up inside her, and she couldn't stop from spewing the rotten reality out.

"I fell for a man who wasn't interested in putting me first. He had other obligations. He was very driven, obsessively so. His whole identity was wrapped up in his goal...I knew that, but I pursued him anyway. My mistake was investing my feelings in someone who couldn't reciprocate them. He considered them a nuisance. And he left me." She brushed her hair back from her face. "And that's when I realized I should be my own priority. Pursue myself instead. I mean, I was an awfully shallow teenager. Not angsty at all." She gave a small smile. "I've always been a little self interested. But when I met him, I learned to care for someone other than myself but ended up learning a hard lesson."

"I'm sorry to hear that."

She waved her hand dismissively. "It's water under the bridge. I'm much better off now. You said you had a robot collection? A robot building hobby?"

"Yeah! I like to build little robots. Like Roombas? Yeah, but ones that clean _and_ cook for you. I even have one that I've programmed to sing. Makes for great karaoke!"

* * *

Bulma shut the front door and made her way to the kitchen, sidling up beside her mom, who was chopping carrots. She unwrapped the scarf from around her neck and popped a chunk of carrot into her mouth.

"Hi, Mom," she greeted, crunching.

"Hi, dear. Did you spend the night at that nice man's house?"

Bulma blushed and stuttered. "Yes, but it wasn't like that. I really had no intention of staying over last night-"

"Isn't that how it usually happens, dear?"

"No! Look, he was telling me all about his robot collection and how he loves to experiment with different energy sources and it was fascinating and he offered to show me and he was even sweet enough to tell me he didn't expect me to stay afterward." _Phew_. She took a deep breath. She had to remember there was nothing to apologize for. "But there I was, knee deep in his robots and we...kind of got carried away. We were up until 4 working on a bot until we both realized how late it was, so he offered me his couch to crash on. So that's what I did!" Her skittishness faded as she leaned forward against the counter, fiddling absently with a hunk of carrot. "There was nothing more to it then that, really. I'm not sure there will ever be. He's interesting and sweet and fun, but, I don't know, he's not..."

"He's not Vegeta, dear?"

Bulma flinched. "What? No, Mom, that's not what I was thinking _at all_." Her hand dropped heavily on the counter.

"He came by to eat with us last night," her mother disclosed, cheerfully.

Bulma paled. "Really? Why?" She tried for nonchalant, but got strained.

"I don't know," her mother observed thoughtfully. "He sat down with us for dinner, we ate a nice meal, and then I told your father about your date. He likes that young man. Vegeta seemed a little concerned, though."

"What?" Bulma shrieked. Mrs. Briefs smiled as she chopped celery, oblivious to her daughter's panic.

"He seemed a little upset you were with that nice young man. Folded his arms, glared at the wall, you know him! Your father really thinks your date is a nice, bright young man."

Bulma's heart pounded as she stared ahead. Did he...did he still have feelings for her? No, it couldn't be. There were other factors, other variables at work. And even if he did still like her, he was making a horrible case for being with him. If he wasn't going to put out the effort to show he cared, then she certainly wasn't going to waste her time with him. She was done with men who had greater priorities than her. Resolved, Bulma grabbed the bag of onions.

"Hand me a knife, Mom. What's for dinner? Chicken soup?"

* * *

The snow fell in buckets on West City, silently churning under streetlights and landing softly on Bulma's face. The cold nipped at her cheeks and her boots crunched the snow against the sidewalk as she walked up her street. The night sky, thick with clouds, was lit scarlet by the Friday night lights of the city. She had insisted on walking home from her date, since the compound was only blocks away.

"I'm a big girl, I'll make it," she had laughed as he teased her about getting lost in the snow.

She needed to quit going out with him, before she was guilty of stringing him along. She brushed the thought away. It was a beautiful night for introspection, but she didn't for the life of her want to go there tonight. She wanted to know only snow, and streetlights, and silence.

She let herself in the front door. The house was silent and murky dark. She stomped her feet at the door and hung up her coat and scarf, smoothing the melting snow out of her hair. She turned and plowed straight into someone's chest. She gasped as he gripped her waist and lowered his head to her neck. Bulma froze, taking shallow breaths. He inhaled deeply and let out a breath against her neck, raising his head to look her dead in the face.

"You haven't been fucking him," Vegeta rumbled. "But you still smell like him," he snarled.

Bulma's mouth hung open. Of all the things she had wanted him to say to her...he had to go and say that? What did she say to that?

"How is it any of your business?" She snapped.

He scowled at her but seemed reluctant to take back his hands. He seemed to finally notice her hair. He lifted one hand from her waist and ran a strand of her straight hair between his fingers. If Bulma had thought herself confused before, she was now even more so. Tangled up in feelings that she thought he'd snuffed out, it irritated her that those feelings were now betraying her. She had to get out of this before she found herself in dangerous waters.

"Why did you change it?" He questioned her, softly.

"Anything to erase the memory of you," she whispered.

His hand stilled on her cheek, and he pulled away.

"Hn," he grunted, glaring down his nose at her, his profile stenciled in the inky darkness.

Bulma watched him walk away, dismally.

The whole house reeked of cinnamon and fried dough. Bulma made her way down the stairs and into the kitchen, pushing back the sleeves of her oversized sweater.

"Hello, dear! How did it go last night?"

Bulma reminded herself that her mom knew nothing about her encounter with Vegeta. "It was fine. Went and saw an artsy movie at the indie cineplex and then went for a few beers. Making doughnuts?"

"Yes! Would you like to help?"

Bulma grabbed one of the little balls of dough sitting on wax paper and rolled it through a bowl of sugar and cinnamon.

"Not bad for a fourth date, then?"

"No," she replied emptily, rolling the ball back and forth, back and forth.

"Have you heard from Vegeta, dear?"

"No! What makes you say that!" She replied, defensively.

"Just curious. You know, your father and I have to go out of town for the East City Pet Expo next weekend, so your father won't be around if something happens to the gravity simulator!"

Bulma's eyes bulged. "_You wouldn't_. How could you guys leave me alone with him!" She hissed.

"Bulma Briefs, I have never known you to be afraid of something that was in your best interest!" Her mother's normally saccharine pitch took on an even more annoying, dreamy quality.

"Vegeta is not in my best interest, Mother. I need to stay far, far away from that man. He's rude and obnoxious. He's bad for my skin," she growled. "I'm done with him. He was a rebound. He was never even a blip in my radar!" She hollered, pounding a ball of dough into the dish of sugar.

"Oh, Bulma, honey, I'd say otherwise, given the amount of heat between you that night in your lab!"

"What?" Bulma squawked.

"Don't you know your father keeps video surveillance of all rooms containing company property?"

"You guys-you guys saw that?" The blood rushed to her face. "What-ugh-you guys-that's gross!"

"I'm sorry, dear, but your father got a call that the code had been hacked to the downstairs labs! Your father didn't stay to watch, but, oh, if I had a man that handsome break in to do those things to me...well, what am I saying! I'm a married woman!"

"Where do you guys keep these tapes!" Bulma's voice rang a few octaves higher than normal.

"Why, in your father's office dear-"

Bulma spun around and raced out of the house, towards the small dome that housed her parent's pets and her father's office. She zipped through the building, scattering wildlife as she went. Her father had abandoned his old labs to be near his pets, who had become like second children to them. Bulma hollered at a dinosaur who stood blocking her path and stomped past him as he shuffled into the flora. _This is a perfect example why Capsule Corporation needs a CEO whose qualifications aren't simply chain smoking and zoo keeping!_

She caught the frame of her father's office, panting. "Dad!"

"Yes, dear?" He didn't bother looking up as he puffed away on a cigarette and fiddled with a sheet of plexiglass.

"Mom wants you! She said it's very important! Hot oil, or something. By the way, where do you keep your surveillance tapes?"

"Well in that case, I will just take an early lunch break. Why, in that third drawer of my file cabinet, dear. Well, then." Her father turned toward the door.

"Don't dilly dally, Dad!" She nudged her father out of the room. Her father meandered his way slowly through the domesticated jungle.

She paced over to the file cabinets and began tearing through tapes. They were dated by week, and she had to really search for it, but she held up the small tape in triumph. _How could I ever forget this date_. She scrambled around, looking for something to play it, cursing and kicking the cabinet when she came up short. Her father didn't even have a TV in there! Just piles of boxes and parts, a few of Vegeta's busted training bots smoking in the corner.

She tore back through the dome and across the lawn, down to the lower levels of the house. Her office smelled stale. She hadn't been down there in months. She pushed in the tape into her tape player and hit the power button on the TV violently, breathing shallowly. She fast forwarded, heart pounding. Much of the tape comprised her sitting at her desk, working. Her stomach clenched. Those were different days.

"Stop!" She yelled as she mashed down the button. There he was. She couldn't breathe. The proud set of his shoulders, his purposeful stride. She touched him lightly on the screen. She felt a hot tear splatter on her hand. She frowned at it and pulled her hand back. She took a deep breath and hit play.

It showed him walking down the corridor, posture rigid as he turned in the doorway. And then...he just stood there. Bulma blinked. But...but...why? She watched him as he watched her work torpidly on an engine model, her laptop blinking beside her, indicating the suit had been disabled. She never even glanced at it. Instead, the tape recorded her fooling around while he watched from the doorway for several minutes. Bulma's eyes watered again. "But why?" She croaked. "Oh, you stupid jerk, how could you lie to me like this?" She cried out, smacking the screen. "What am I so torn up over you?"

She dissolved into tears, burying her head in her hands, when she heard someone call her name.

Bulma lifted her head heavily and saw Puar's concerned face. Puar enveloped Bulma in a hug.

"Oh, Puar," she sobbed. "What is wrong with me?" She balled into Puar's fur. As her crying jag tapered off, she rubbed her eyes with the balls of her hands and sniffled. "I'm sorry, Puar."

"So it's true?" Puar asked gently.

Bulma nodded. "You probably have no sympathy for me, and I don't blame you. _Ah!_ Puar, close your eyes!" She blindfolded the shape changing cat with her hands, Puar squeaking in surprise. Bulma stared, absorbed in the events taking place on the monitor. She watched as Vegeta stripped her of her shorts and gulped as she watched him press his face between her legs.

"Oh my goodness," she whispered. "I have a sex tape!"

Puar squeaked.

"It will be over in a minute, Puar," she consoled her sadly. Sure enough, she watched as her body became contorted in pleasure, hips opened wide for Vegeta as her mouth began moving. _My big fat mouth_. She suppressed a shiver as Vegeta took his shirt off and pinned her to the wall only a moment before dropping her on the table. Bulma watched it in all its sensational horror. As the past Bulma scrambled after Vegeta to yell at him in the corridor, present Bulma hands slowly slid from Puar's eyes and drifted under her chin to hold her heavy head. "Oh, Puar," she lamented, "did I just go wrong when I picked someone so emotionally unavailable? Or was he trying to start something with me, just in his own way? Either way, I screwed up." She pushed stop on the two characters, wiped her eyes, and set her resolve.

"I'm sorry, Puar. I've been a bad friend. What did you want to talk to me about?" She smiled weakly. "It's been so long since I've seen anyone or anything besides paperwork."

"I'm sorry, Bulma," Puar confessed, "but that's what I came to talk to you about. I knew about Yamcha that night and I didn't tell you."

"Puar, did he-no, I don't want to know. It doesn't matter anymore."

"He didn't go there," Puar stuttered. "He sure was trying to impress her, though." She said sourly.

Bulma was relieved. Even though their relationship had its bumps, at least it hadn't ended so trashily. _Close, though._

"I don't think less of you for leaving, Bulma. You will always be my friend."

"Thank you." She giggled. "Definitely a girls reunion, huh? Now that we're done crying on each other's shoulders, would you like to stay for dinner?"

"Sure! But, Bulma, are you...are you still seeing him?"

"No," Bulma shook her head vigorously. "Not for months now...if ever. I'm kind of seeing someone else," she said wistfully. "It's not serious." _Probably never will be, if my record with men proves accurate._

"Did he...did he hurt you?" Puar asked her, firmly.

"Vegeta?" She howled. "No! Of course not! We just had our irreconcilable disagreements, is all. Now come on, I'm tired of crying into my proverbial soup. Let's go see if my mother's finished with those donuts."

Puar nodded, but as she followed Bulma out of the room, she glanced back hatefully at the TV screen.

* * *

Bulma shuffled through the papers fanned out on her desk, which covered up more paperwork, which all needed reviewing. She rubbed her eyes and scribbled her signature once more. It was almost time to go, although Bulma figured she'd be staying late another Friday, like usual. She had dinner plans Saturday, but she had been chewing over canceling them all day. She wasn't interested in playing the field right now and was worried she was inadvertently stringing him along, but she didn't want to lose her tenuous hold on a social life outside her usual friends.

The hairs on her neck stood up and a shadow washed over her. There was a creak in front of her desk as someone settled into the chair.

She glanced up from her paperwork and went back to reading.

Vegeta reclined in the chair across from her, his head in his hand as he sent her a bored look. "The gravity room is broken," he commented.

"That's right. My parents are out of town. It was only time until you'd come to fetch me. Since you can't seem to use the gravity room without abusing it."

He sent her a small smirk from across the desk. "That's right."

"I guess even the Prince of Saiyans has a limit to his restraint," she mused, mockingly.

"I wouldn't challenge my restraint, if I were you."

Her coworkers stole anxious glances at the pair as their comments drifted outside her cubicle.

"I'm surprised you didn't just wait for me to get home, seeing how you fail to be civil to even one person at a time. You can't even seem to manage tolerating yourself."

Vegeta's smirk faded.

"Or Kame forbid you figure out how to pick up a phone," she remarked, her pen punctuating the tense atmosphere with little scratchy sounds as she checked boxes.

Vegeta growled, but then waved his hand dismissively. "Go tell your boss you're leaving."

Bulma dropped her pen and papers on her desk and let out a breath. "Fine. I'll just be a minute." She felt his eyes on her as she stepped into her boss's office, letting him know she'd be leaving. By this time, everyone in the office was pulling on their coats and laughing as they wished each other to have a good weekend. Seething, she made her way back through the office to collect her briefcase and peacoat when she bumped into somebody.

Her date. "Are we still on for Saturday?" He grinned, and then scrutinized her pained expression. "Is something wrong?"

She felt Vegeta's presence at her elbow, who stared with deadly calm at her coworker.

Bulma grimaced. What's wrong, she thought, was very blatantly beside her. "No. I've just got to run home and take care of a problem, that's all." She felt Vegeta grip her upper arm as though he were escorting her somewhere. She got the point.

She gave her date a small smile. "See you later."

Vegeta held her briefcase and her coat in his other hand. She plucked her coat from his hand and tugged it on angrily, grabbed her briefcase, and stomped out of the office. Vegeta's hand was just as quickly around her arm again, and he steered her toward the elevator, holding her still while he pushed the button. Bulma was about to boil over. A few of her coworkers milled around them, glancing questioningly, but at his generous dark scowls, they held their tongues. The elevator dinged, and Vegeta led Bulma in. His grip on her arm wasn't rough, but it was firm. Bulma was acutely aware of how it made them look. She felt like a ticking time bomb, ready to explode. How dare he intrude on her sanctuary? How dare he? She held on to her dignity with barely restrained rage.

The doors were already opening in front of them. The elevator emptied out onto the first floor, a long, shallow lobby with high ceilings, towering panes of glass walls, and modernized chandeliers queued from one end to the other. Bulma tugged her coat collar up and matched Vegeta's pace as he led her through the throng of people. Every now and then, someone would call out to her. "Have a good evening, Bulma!" But it didn't put a damper on Vegeta's pace.

He pushed back the steel doors, and they were deposited outside, taxis honking and people clogging the sidewalks, rushing homeward or across town for the dinner hour. The sky was a dull, wooly gray, spitting out the occasional flurry.

Vegeta turned to her and grinned toothily. "I suppose this is the part where I ask you if you trust me?"

"What?" Bulma looked up at him, confused. He was only wearing a long sleeved, black t shirt and black trousers. Shouldn't he be shivering? The black looked really good against his bronzed skin, making the deep mahogany color of his eyes seem more intense. His thick, inky black hair she had once loved to comb her fingers through, his full lashes, his sharply angled features. He was having an unsettling effect on her, and she didn't like it one bit.

"Do you trust me, Onna?"

She flinched at his use of her pet name. Although it could hardly be called polite, it had been so long since she had heard it, and she was shocked by how hungry she was to hear it again.

Her brows settled into an intimidating frown. "No. Not at all. Why?"

Suddenly, his arms were around her. Without any hesitation, her world narrowed down to their embrace, their bodies pressed together as he smirked down at her.

And then he was scooping her up and rocketing them upwards, flying them up and over the office building in a beeline towards the Capsule Corp compound. She threw her arms around his neck instinctually and clung to him, her hair whipping behind her as she held on to her briefcase desperately. It was almost impossible to breathe. The air wasn't only thin, but it was freezing. She squirmed in his arms until her face was pressed into the crook of his neck, shielding her from the wind and allowing her to catch her breath. Vegeta slowed and dropped down, hovering safely over the brittle, yellowed grass outside the ship on her lawn. As his feet touched ground, he carefully lowered her legs, giving her a second to regain her bearings before letting go of her completely. She stood stiffly, her hair tangled and her scarf hanging limply and askew.

Vegeta strode up the ramp and pushed the door open. "Are you coming?" He didn't bother waiting for an answer.

She didn't even have time to consider what had just happened before she was marching up the ramp after him, her fists swinging at her sides.

"What's the big idea, you jerk? I don't even have my toolbox yet!"

He pointed at the floor, his back still to her as he grabbed a white towel and lopped it around his neck.

"Right there. The chrome tile next to the console. Your father installed a toolbox under the floor should I need to fix something simple."

Bulma scoffed. "You? Fix Something? Since when did you do anything that made someone else's life easier?"

He glowered in her direction. "The gravity won't engage."

Bulma let out a huff. She unwound her scarf and shrugged out of her coat, throwing them on the console. She tucked her hair back from her face and slid her fingers over the touch screen console. "This doesn't make sense." Concerned, she bent and grabbed the handle of the unique tile and pulled up. She flipped the lid back and rummaged inside for a ratchet and a feeler gauge. As she bent down to check inside the gravity console, she saw Vegeta descend into his _katas_. She rolled her eyes and peered upward into the guts of the console. Just as she let out an exasperated breath, finding no cause for alarm, she heard the vid screen click on, followed by a string of high pitched, maniacal giggles.

She froze. "Huh?"

"Say your prayers, Vegeta! Now you won't be able to hurt anyone anymore."

Bulma pushed her self carefully out from under the console and sat up, confused. She peered around the console and saw Vegeta turn toward the vid screen, where Puar's image scowled fiercely down at him. Puar laughed again and held up a small remote device with a single red button. Suddenly, the ship engines roared to life. Bulma's eyes got wide.

"See ya, wouldn't wanna be ya!" Puar screeched, bravely pushing the red button on the remote, as Vegeta bent into a defensive stance.

Bulma stood up as the shrill of the engine became an overpowering ringing in her ears. "Puar? What's going on?" She yelled over the noise.

Puar looked suddenly ill. "Bulma? Oh, no!"

The ship blasted upwards. Bulma gripped the console, her teeth clenched, as they thrust upward through the sky. "Puar," she grit out. "What did you do?"

"I'm so sorry, Bulma! I didn't know you were on board!"

Bulma felt like the pressure was going to squash her into a pancake. She couldn't move if she wanted to. Her mind began chattering, in fear for her life, as they hurdled through the last of the Earth's atmosphere. As they ascended out of orbit, the pressure let off and the engine noise faded to nothing.

Unglued, Bulma raced over to a port hole. Outside the window, it was pitch black, except for small, immovable pin pricks of light from stars millions of light years away. Her heart leapt into her throat.

"Puar..." She strode over to the console, flipping through commands on the screen, growing increasingly agitated. She smacked her hand on the console and barked, "Puar, what did you just do?"

"I'm so sorry! I triggered lift off remotely after I set override coordinates and jammed the computer." Puar was in tears. "That was what your father said, anyway, when I tricked him into telling me how to do it."

Bulma finally turned toward Vegeta, who'd stood fuming in the same spot since liftoff.

"We can't go back. Not until we've reached our destination. The main computer is shot so I can't make a bit of difference!" She threw her hand towards the console, appealing to him fearfully. "Surely we don't even have enough fuel to make it there!"

Vegeta stood scowling at her, his expression unreadable, but his body language tense. "There's enough fuel."

"What? I'm surprised we made it beyond orbit, Vegeta! This ship has one use only-the gravity room! It's never even been into space!"

"It has fuel, so quit your shrieking." Vegeta finally seemed to come back to life. "Where are we headed?" He asked Puar gruffly.

"I don't know! I just typed in random numbers!" She wailed.

"What numbers!" He barked, a vein popping out on his forehead.

"24-67-72-19!"

What is this, the lottery!" Bulma shrieked.

Vegeta glowered. "That's the Monoceros Stellar Stream. You've just sent us to Cold territory, you mangy cat."

"What does it matter how cold it is when we won't have enough fuel to get there!" Bulma screamed, squaring off in front of him.

"We have enough fuel, damnet! I ordered your father to refuel the ship last week!"

Bulma stuttered, her mouth moving like a fish, her pointer finger drooping. "You...you were going to leave?"

He growled and crossed his arms, turning back towards the video projection of Puar, who was wringing her hands and shifting her gaze back and forth between them.

"There's a dwarf planet, M139, inside Monoceros that exists as an interstellar bizarre. We should be able to find the parts for the ship you're looking for so that we can return," he told her curtly, turning away from them.

Without thinking, Bulma whispered defeatedly, "Why, so you can leave again?"

He didn't bother to respond, heading towards the stairs that would take him down into the living compartments.

Bulma turned morosely back to Puar's image.

"I'm sorry, Bulma," Puar murmured.

Bulma nodded her head dully.

"Please stay safe," Puar pled, and then signed off.

Bulma stood alone in the engulfing silence of the gravity room. Lost in the cold vastness of space, her personal belongings thrown over the controls were the only indication that she still existed.

"What am I going to do?" She whimpered.

She cocked a hip and crossed her arms. "And how am I supposed to do it in a pencil skirt! Ugh!" She pulled out a crate from under the console and sat down, staring listlessly down at the controls. She took a deep breath.

First, she wouldn't waste her time crying about something she couldn't change.

Second, she would find out exactly what's up with the ship.

And then, she was going downstairs to say a few things to a Saiyan that she should have said a long time ago.

* * *

A/N: Hey, all! I tried very hard to write the OC who is pursuing Bulma without a name. Did you notice that? Did it work? I was going to give him a name-Stephen, Jim, or something Japanese, who knows-but I wanted to make sure that he stayed on the fringes of the story symbolically. I didn't want to drag in an OC and step on any toes. Especially one that comes between our favorite romance.

Also, I hope there wasn't too much angst or too much dialogue during the date scene for your tastes. I just wanted to make it clear what had happened in the interim, and that Bulma, despite being awfully unhappy, is (was) committed to living a life without the Saiyan Prince.

Which she's going to have a hard time doing, now that they're stuck on a ship together.


	6. What Is Freedom

Disclaimer: Isn't a disclaimer on a site explicitly called "fanfiction" a little redundant?

__What Is Freedom_

Her heels rapped on the steel grating as she descended the spiral stairs. The living quarters were dim, and she peered through the thick quiet of the lower chamber. The only light came from the empty bathroom, which cast a redolent rectangle across the bed. That's how she found him, sprawled out on the solitary full sized bed on his back with his eyes closed, his head cushioned on his crossed arms.

How could he be so relaxed at a time like this? She understood he had spent a great deal of his time in space, keeping cool as a cucumber as only a self satisfied predator could. Being blasted into the heavens wasn't anything new to him. The experience wasn't exactly new for her, either. It was just...them! How could he act so unrestrained, so casual, when all that had happened between them weighed so heavily on her?

_Ugh! There is nothing between us! Remember the last half year, Bulma Briefs? The last half year where you totally didn't have anything going on with this jerk? _

She was a strong, independent lady, a verified modern day woman. If she was single, it's because _she_ wanted to be. She knew what she wanted and she went after it. Right? She didn't let anyone walk all over her. So, she just needed to tie up any loose ends between them. Then they could get down to business, getting to and from the trade planet smoothly, and back to her totally lame and lackluster life on Earth.

She stood, spine straight, at the end of the bed. Despite her appeal for control, her gaze slid across his features. She knew he wasn't sleeping. He wouldn't tolerate anyone this close to him without some kind of plan of attack. He had made a show of his cunning many times before. She rolled her eyes. But even with his features supine, softened in the glow from the bathroom, he seemed coiled, prepared..._to a fault, _she hissed inwardly_. _She wrinkled her nose in derision and scowled at him. That was the whole problem. _Being ten steps ahead of everyone just makes him hyper vigilant and isolated. No one will ever be allowed to get close to him. But the whole universe has to capitulate and revolve around his indifference to them. Ugh, this man! What a royal pain in the ass! _Well, she was going to put an end to this mess.

"We need to talk," she huffed, cutting the silence.

"What do you want," he rumbled, unmoving.

Bulma's hackles rose. "The ship's computer is wiped out, just in case you were wondering. It's been programmed to fly, and that's _it_! I checked the map and we have enough fuel to get there," she squinted sidelong at him, "like you said, but we will need to refuel once we get there. Our air conditioning and our water supply should last the trip there, but we'll have to reign in our appetites. We don't have much food to survive your Saiyan stomach. A week and a half. That's it. You just need to ration your portions for thirteen days."

"Now that business is taken care of, why are you still standing there?"

Bulma saw red. "Why are you such a big jerk?" She seethed. "Fine, in order of importance. One! I am not sharing a bed with you! Go sleep in the gravity room. Two! I'm not putting up with your smart aleck comments or your bullying! Three-"

"_My_ bullying!" He glanced at her, clearly agitated. "Just what exactly is it that you're doing? You came down here with one intention-to intimidate me! As if."

Bulma gasped. His colloquialism was totally lost on her. "I did not! I'm here to do you a favor, meat head!"

"I told you before, I don't need any favors!"

"Yeah, yeah, tough guy, we all know you can do _evvvvverything_ by yourself! And that's why your right hand will be your best friend for the rest of your life!"

Vegeta's fury diminished, and he broke out into indolent chuckles, closing his eyes despite her.

"Alright, Onna, go ahead and give me the third degree. Make yourself feel better. Prove something to yourself by putting me in check, just like you did last time, and let's see where it gets you."

She paled as she curled her hands into fists. "Now you listen here-"

He shot out of bed. "No, you listen to me. You've been meting out punishments and demands since I touched down on your god forsaken planet. Well, I've had enough control to last a whole lifetime, so go pester someone else!"

Is that...is that how he really saw her? Bulma could feel tears forming stupidly at the corners of her eyes. She wasn't expecting to be yelled at. Why did she come down here again? She tried desperately to hold onto a thread of the determination she had when she woke him up.

"Three. You need to relax," she cleared her throat unsuccessfully. Isn't that what she was going to say? "Your damn," she sniffled, "your damned pride always gets in the way of our business."

"Business." He scoffed. "Everything is a business to you now. Your hair, your boyfriend. Some way to relax, as you've been demanding from me for a year now. But what about you?" He appealed her softly, unrelenting. "What have you been doing for the last six months? Sitting up on your pedestal, keeping yourself very carefully in control. Doing all your paper work, dating boring office types. If anyone needs to learn a lesson in humility, it's you!"

"My work life has nothing to do with you!"

"It has everything to do with me. You couldn't handle that I wouldn't be leashed, so you tried putting a lid on me instead. I'm the Prince of all Saiyans! No one can put a lid on me."

He was all feral beauty and predatory grace. She loved to watch him train, watch him sleep, watch him deliberate, watch him eat. She loved just watching him, even strutting towards her, infuriated.

Vegeta stopped stalking towards her when she glanced up at him, his intent to berate her stalled by a force in her eyes even greater than his injured pride.

Longing.

"I didn't," Bulma croaked, "I didn't put a lid on you. You put a lid on me. When you left me in the hallway, like a coward. Punishing _me_ ever since. If you didn't want to return my god forsaken feelings for you, fine, you're entitled to that. But don't you dare accuse me of running, when you're the one who literally shut me out of your life." Her eyes rolled to the ceiling and she brushed her bangs out of her face. "I felt like a pawn in your game of power. I thought I was your...friend."

"We were never friends," he stated, coldly. Vegeta, flustered by Bulma's emotions for him, was doing some self examination, and he wasn't comfortable with it one bit. He felt a little trapped,causing him to bite back. "Self preservation has been my job for two decades. You're a fool if you think I could be otherwise," he mumbled grimly.

If Bulma hadn't have known him better, she would have missed the apology in the thick of his cruel delivery. Was this her opportunity to get through to him?

"I'm a fool for believing you to be better than that. You have a chance now unlike any before. You're free!" He stiffened, but she went on. "You're free to do whatever you want now. You don't have to be like that anymore. You're just a man, free to do all the things you never could do. Relax by a pool on a sunny day. Fly around with your eyes closed. Free to create your own expectations for yourself. Free to enjoy things and to accept that other people may enjoy you." At his silence, she ventured, "Free to eat all kinds of new foods just for the pleasure of it?" He rolled his eyes, but she thought she definitely saw a smirk for a second. "You're free, Vegeta," she implored, sadly. "You don't have to play these games with me. Whatever you may think, I am not trying to manipulate you."

He glowered. "Don't lie to me, Onna. You wear your heart on your sleeve, you're a terrible liar. That night, you sought to play a game with me, to break me to your will."

She stared at him, chastened. "Vegeta, I didn't..." She swallowed her words. What had she done, if not try to force him into obeisance? She had dismissed his feelings, treating his concerns...the feelings he had for her...as illegitimate, in order to mold him, as if the Vegeta that had stood before her wasn't good enough. She had resented him for rejecting her, but wasn't she culpable, too? Her guilt was only overshadowed by her realization that she had hurt him. "I...I guess I did. I'm sorry. I didn't realize what...what it meant to you."

It was his turn to be taken aback. Did she just...apologize to him? In Frieza's dominion, there was no quarter for apologies, and, if one wanted to survive, no room for regret. Feelings took a few gulping breaths and died in Cold Space. Frieza's reign on the body was absolute: your body was his property, your actions inventoried, your feelings rationed, your experiences outside of the martial, sharply curbed. Only competence and aggressiveness were rewarded, and in the Prince's case, they were the only thing keeping what little was left of his race and culture alive.

As frustrating as being stuck on Earth waiting for Kakarot to return was initially, this slight, bubbly, and fearless blue haired scientist had made it bearable. It didn't make any sense. She constantly intruded on the personal bubble he had carved out in service to the White Lizard, as the Saiyans called him. Appealing to the Saiyans overwhelming ego, brokering an alliance of strength and technology, Frieza had swept through the sprawling desert planet like a north wind, bartering for more than was deserved and then effectively extinguishing it with icy circumspect. Groomed as a royal to a race of warriors, whose technological spoils of war allowed a burgeoning hope of territory and pride beyond their own planet's atmosphere, the Prince had never thought twice about the fallibility of destiny. When his father had sold him into servitude to the White Lizard to buy the continuation of their race, he had shorn him of his destiny and severed him from arrival-to the throne, to a legend, to destroying the Ice-jinn bastard's hold on space with all the proud Saiyan berserkers at his side. Vegeta promptly put his faith for his father in the rubbish. As he grew up in service to such an irrefutable aggressor whose very business seemed to be sowing the seeds of cruelty around the galaxies, all the Prince could do was seethe, and sketch a plan...of attack, of escape, of vengeance.

Instead, his spilled blood and labored sweat, work he couldn't even get the satisfaction of calling his own, were sketched grimly across the tiles of Frieza's ship. Any hopes of outsmarting or overpowering the lizard were dashed against the rocks early on. Vegeta had been misled by the Saiyans. Although they were renown for their brute strength, they couldn't hold a candle to the portentous, elusive power that surged around Frieza. Not only did he have to live with the shame over the weakness of his people and his routine humiliation at Frieza's hands, he even had to withstand the taunting of the other Planet Trade Organization elites-Cui's malevolence, Zarbon's sadism, Ginyu's sinister showmanship-and continue living. Any despair born from his circumstances was swept up in a strong wave of life preserving disregard and sheltering negligence. The only thing that thrived under Frieza's foot, was vitriol. And it was Vegeta's only thrill.

And here was this water spright, this siren, calling him to be swept out to sea, to just let go.

His pride, his whole blackened history, couldn't allow for her commandeering. He had left her that night in the hallway in a storm of fury and self righteousness. No one made a fool of the Prince of Saiyans. No one could get close to him because everyone would inevitably betray him. She was making him feel things, and her maneuvering was a sharp reminder that he couldn't afford feelings. Being an elite in Frieza's service was a game of thrones. Care and flounder. Strategize or die.

He had locked the gravity room against her in a raging effort to remake himself a ruler, a conquerer, an heir to a legacy that, had it not sold out, could still be breathing the hot, arid air under three red giant suns in pure resistance and glory. His people, his father, as they struggled merging their warrior culture with the Tuffles stolen civilization, had hesitated at the wrong moment. They had tried making a decision that was against their nature in an attempt to recycle the Tuffles civility that they had always envied and been outcast from. Vegeta knew, he had sat in on the meetings. The Saiyans secretly yearned for advancement. They had paid the ultimate price for their misstep. And so had the Prince.

As he peered down at Bulma, he hardly registered that his hands were clenched around her shoulders, as though he was trying to shake her out of a dream.

Bulma stood gazing up at him in wonder.

The only problem was that his Saiyan instincts were screaming at him to conquer the little scientist, who was, ludicrously, a lurid example of the Tuffles intelligence and emotion, which his father and his father before him lived to plunder and squash out of existence.

The fight he was having with himself was singing a lullaby of primal desire, wrapping around his senses. The struggle against his Saiyan blood screaming at him to conquer her, enfold her, unfurl his Saiyan might around her, claim her, herald her as a trophy towards advancement, wasn't one he could win easily. He prided himself on his resistance against all odds, his fluidity in the heat of battle, his stubbornness in the face of loss. But desire and need for her were so intertwined that he could not make heads or tails of his own heady attraction to the smart, brave waif as separate from the Oozaru-like call for her. His people's voice, speaking through him, weaving in and out of her own beguiling appeal to him. She was worthy of kings, with a tongue like a lash and a quick silver mind...a welcoming embrace that forgave him his past atrocities, soft skin that beckoned him into _feeling_, cleansing azure eyes, laughter that encouraged him to laugh with him, to share joy, to relax and let the waves carry him who knows where over the horizon. She had, from the second he stepped on to Earth, fearlessly met his cold Saiyan fire with her own hot lust for life. He grit his teeth while she wasted herself on that weakling, as Scarface turned her vibrant ultramarines a melancholy indigo. She had given him a chance without asking him to repent, infiltrating his draconian self regiment with the one weapon he was ignorant to and powerless against-all inclusive joy. And even though her world had come crashing to a close after his pod sunk into her precious Earth in a violent clamor of screams and dust, her life irreversibly altered with Raditz's transmission, she still had the guts to engage him in a battle of wits every time he turned around. He couldn't stand to watch as she retaliated against him by joining with her father's company, lining their pockets with zenni at the detriment to her well being. She had withered. No longer was she the siren, singing him into a spell to sink below the surf. Her fire had puttered out into a dully pulsing ember. Her joy had ebbed and become stagnant. Surrounded by papers and cubicles and the machinations of office life, the only thing she was fighting anymore were her feelings.

Just like when he found his feet taking him to her that night with the snow melting in her hair, the street lights from the windows glancing off the droplets of water pearled in her eyelashes as she readjusted to the dark, he now absently ran his hands through her hair, his thumbs over her temples. He rested his face against hers, finally powerless against it, and she leaned into him, her smooth cheek against his as they stood holding each other in the dark, one wet tear trail baptizing him.

* * *

A/N: Hey, guys! I'm sorry about the time lapse. It's been a few months. *nervously chuckles* Well, shortly after I published my last chapter, my husband came home from a year's deployment over seas, we picked up and moved across the country, and we were settling into a life together again when I got hit with a mysterious illness that I've been contending with the last month and a half. So, *blows bangs out of face,* I've been busy. Also, I really struggled with this chapter. I've had a plot line laid out since the get go, but I just couldn't pick what I really to convey in this chapter. I tried to force myself to write, and that was basically fruitless. Then, yesterday, it was a dark and stormy, blustery afternoon (Winnie the Pooh reference, anyone?), and I just kind of gravitated toward the computer, turned Bat For Lashes on blisteringly loud, and wrote it all up. I'm sorry that it's not as long as my last few chapters, but I'm comfortable with the length. After all, there's more to come.

Our characters should be making landfall next time!

Please review!


	7. Shaken But Not Stirred

Disclaimer: Sgt. Frog reads _Gundam_ fan fic and complains about the unmotivated love scenes. I'm just happy I have the right to write fan fiction.

__Shaken, But Not Stirred_

"Be quiet, woman, they'll hear you! How did I get stuck with the biggest loud mouth this side of the galaxy?" Vegeta muttered distastefully, bristling.

"Because you put fuel in the ship, idiot," she mumbled, rolling her eyes and crossing her arms as she turned from him, imitating his own stiff demeanor unknowingly.

"I won't tell you again. The market is neutral space, but the rest of the people of this world are a bunch of behind the times backwater nomads who believe aggressively in the INVISIBILITY and SILENCE of women!"

"That's barbaric!"

"It is what it is. Try talking them out of it and we'll see how long it takes for your head to roll!"

Bulma let out a huff and kicked at the sand in front of them. "What do you suggest we do then?"

They stood at the rim of what Bulma had quickly coined a "parking garage for flying saucers" (a moniker which seemed to rankle the Saiyan Prince), where grated metal met a blanket of white sand that stretched endlessly around them. They were buffeted by the dry, hot wind as they surveyed the landscape in front of them. A few miles off, she could make out the bazaar, or "Tent City," sprawled across the expanse of desert in front of them. It was as massive as a small city, teeming and pulsing even at this distance with people in the business of living. Vegeta had informed her that ships weren't allowed within three miles of Tent City, so these "parking garages" accommodated interstellar travelers. Towering, spiral installations, they protruded from the sand like sleek, mechanized conch shells hovering warily around Tent City. Their spiked peaks pointed accusingly at the opalescent, powder blue sky. The nomads, or _Eeyuris_, had allowed visitors on the condition that business and crime were to be contained. The _Eeyuris_ were able to convince potential entrepreneurs of this by force: their heads on pikes for the next wave of prospectors to take as a cautionary tale. Wayfaring and without "civilization," perhaps, but savagely protective of their uncultivated, barren home.

Bulma, a little petulantly, disagreed with their values.

"Whose pride is too big to be contained now, woman," he grumbled as they waited in line for the _Eeyuris_ pack animals-a large, spindly, reptile-like creature that Bulma couldn't look at lest she wrinkle her face by deeply wincing in horror-to be saddled by some robed _Eeyuris_.

"Not as big as your hair," she grit out.

Their week and a half of traveling at light speed towards M183 had gone smoothly enough. Vegeta, for the most part, hadn't left the upper floor except to eat and use the bathroom, which Bulma took in stride. She knew they both needed time to adjust to new feelings and the new turn of events. Bulma had tried keeping herself occupied, given that she hadn't brought anything along with her except her briefcase, loaded solely with paperwork and a few crumbs, and the clothes on her back, which were becoming quite uncomfortable. She had tried to wash them, at least, in the sink, but the air conditioning keeping the humidity bearable was making it nearly impossible for them to dry. So Bulma had marched ingenuously up the stairs in her underwear clutching the damp office attire, and laid them flat on the console, seating herself in the captain's chair as she waited for the heat of the controls to dry her only clothes.

Vegeta had only raised an eyebrow, to which Bulma snarled, "What are you looking at?"

Even if a truce had been called, the tedium was keeping them both a little on edge.

Except...before landfall, she had come up the stairs after she had heard the toneless, feminine voice chime "One hour to landfall," only to find Vegeta leaning uncharacteristically pensive against the front wall of windows. She had gripped his arm in camaraderie and watched the universe expand around them in the empty silence of the ship, until he had turned his head to her, ghosted her a glance, and relaxed fractionally into her. She hadn't expected huge strides to be made between them so quickly, but she found herself a little pleasantly surprised that he would show her such small, but profound, affection. Their relationship was a little like rehabilitating a wild animal; she would nurse the distance, knowing a man this wild couldn't be kept.

The _Eeyuris_ made a motion at them, and Vegeta led her toward him and the creature. Unexpectedly, he offered her a hand up.

"Please get yourself some real clothes when we get there," she heard him growl from behind her as she settled into the leathered saddle. He seated himself fluidly behind her, and the animal lurched forward. Bulma quickly gripped the pommel as the _Eeyuris_ led them across the expanse.

"And what, may I ask, are real clothes?" She snapped.

"Clothes that allow for some motility."

"Oh, like my swimsuit?" She smiled. She could almost feel the Prince stiffen behind her. "I'll keep your preference in mind when we get home."

"That's not what I meant." She could feel him gesture to her high waisted pencil skirt. "I'm surprised you haven't fallen down, unable to get up." She snorted. "It's unsafe to wear restrictive clothing, and while we are out in space, we need to be prepared."

"Would you rather me without it?" She turned back to him, smiling deviously at his exasperated blush, which he followed with a smirk that heated her through.

"Only if you're in the kitchen making me dinner."

Bulma growled and settled for watching Tent City get nearer, like a heap of coins glinting and rusting in the baking hot sunlight, dropped by some drunk, rustic god and held together by its own ugly, stubborn will to live.

* * *

Vegeta led her through alley after alley, through several passageways draped with beautiful, clay-hued rugs, some framed with long fringe, others braided with a motley of precious stones. Earth huts and tents dyed a burnt umber lined the street, sheltering sellers hawking wares. The myriad people that made up Tent City were overwhelming. Bulma began making up names for them as Vegeta pulled her forward through the crowd. There was Hammy, a stalwart, pig-nosed fellow with tentacles selling doodads; Burrows, a roach peddling whats-a-ma-call-its that looked suspiciously like bug traps; and a bulbous purple creature she christened Sweet Potato, because his thing-a-lings looked like mason jars packed with spiced yams. Just as Bulma began to question her sanity, Vegeta stopped her in front of a large woven tent. She glanced over his shoulder and had to clamp her mouth on a whoop of joy.

"Tech. Yes," Vegeta inserted wryly, his hand tightening on her arm. "You brought some capsules, right?" She nodded enthusiastically. Her father had thought well to add some empty capsules to the first aid kit. "Five things. Got it? That's it. Find yourself five pieces of tech that can outlast your curiosity, because I am not dragging you out here again. Find us a new motherboard. Capsulize it all."

She nodded again, eagerly, and she saw amusement glint his eyes.

"Get out of here," he commanded.

As she ran her hands over parts and gadgets, Bulma thought maybe she had died in space and gone to Heaven.

* * *

Bulma tugged at the tops of her soft thigh high boots and picked at the tight tube jumpsuit that fit a little too snugly over her lady parts.

"Are space women built like sticks? Is this really fashionable in this part of the galaxy? I'm channeling Lara Croft, here. Or Jane Fonda. Maybe a space pirate. I just need a peg leg or something-"

"Are you done playing with your décolletage? I'm hungry." Vegeta interrupted, his back towards her. Trying on clothes wasn't his thing, obviously.

"Of course you are. I just feel a little...exposed," Bulma complained, threading her capsule case strap onto her right thigh. Lara Croft it was.

"Says the woman whose idea of an appropriate amount of modesty is negligible."

She was sure he was whining now. Despite his menacing stance and his grumpy, harrowed expression, she leaned in and purred, "It's just, I'm not wearing any underwear."

His eyes widened. "Where did it go?"

"It was two weeks old and crusty! Jeez! I threw it in the garbage over there." She gestured towards the bin near the dressing rooms.

Vegeta bit down on a smile and managed to look chagrined. "Onna, you've just made some sad alien's day. Now let's go!"

As they churned through the crowd, the smell of body odor and dust began to be replaced by the savory smell of roasted meat.

"Now what?" She plaintively asked, on his heels.

"We eat. We buy groceries. We get off this mudball. I paid the _Eeyuris_ to refuel our ship. After food is taken care of, our business is done here."

"How have you been paying for all of this? And why are you so eager to leave this place? Let's have some fun while we're out in space!"

"I have credit."

"That card you've been using? Like, a debit card?"

"It's crystarium. It's linked to an account I kept secret from Frieza. I imagine the account he held for me has been liquidated, by now." He leveled a quick frown at her. "I may seem like a 'mooch' on Earth, as Kakarot's harpy calls me. But out in space," he grinned devilishly, "I'm quite rich."

"Oh." Bulma replied stupidly. She had no idea. "How did you make your money?"

He glanced back at her, again pulling her through the crowd. "Killing."

Bulma stalled, and then hopped the few steps to catch back up to him.

"What a brute," she muttered.

He yanked her to the edge of the street and twirled her into his arms, crashing his lips against hers in a searing kiss and leaning her against a vendor's mud hut. His hands raked through her hair, curved around the ball of her shoulder, and lingered over her breasts. She shivered.

"It turns you on when I call you names, does it?" She giggled.

"I'm a beast," he whispered against her lips. He grabbed her hips and pulled her close. "A monster."

"It's criminal," she breathed.

"I am that, too."

"With a bounty on his head worth more crystarium than an empire," breezed a voice from beside them.

Vegeta cocked his head toward it, disaffected.

"What a surprise. I should have known you'd rise from the grave just to pester me," he drawled. He leaned on his arm next to her head, blocking her view of the stranger.

"Don't flatter yourself, Vegeta. I'm not here to pester you."

A smirk tugged upward at Vegeta's lips. "Then why are you here, wasting my time? Run along and play."

"I'm not here to pester you. I'm here to collect on you."

And, with that, Vegeta's body seized violently in front of her, his eyes widening and rolling back into his head as he crumpled to the ground, his limbs sticking out awkwardly behind him.

Horror shot through her and she reached out to him, crying his name, as she looked up into the eyes of the man to blame.

"Hello," he said congenially. "We've already met." He flicked his braid over his shoulder and smirked.

"I'm Zarbon. And you're dead."

There was a hard crack to her temple, and Bulma's world went black.

* * *

Bulma became aware of a stuffiness in her head and a loud ringing in her ears first as she surfaced from the fog of unconsciousness. Blinking through heavy eyelids, the spinning world slowly pieced together into focus. When she saw Vegeta lying prone on his side in front of her, her heart started hammering. She quickly assessed their surroundings.

Her hands and feet were bound. She wiggled them, but they were too tight to budge. The floor felt rough, like untreated wood. She could hear a steady, gritty sound. They must be moving, over sand. She glanced upwards. It looked as if they were in a covered cart. She could just make out Vegeta's tied hands through dim light of dusk.

She wriggled toward him, inching desperately, slowly towards him. "Vegeta," she whispered. He moaned and twitched. "Vegeta!" She pressed her head against her shoulder blade, nudging him with her head. "Wake up, you stubborn, infuriating man," she pled into his shirt.

Very slowly, Vegeta's head turned upwards. "What's going on," he managed hoarsely.

"We've been captured. Zarbon knocked us out. He's taking us somewhere. Are you going to be okay?" She hadn't expected the Prince of Saiyans to fall like that; and, she suspected, neither had he. Her brow furrowed with concern.

He didn't reply. She was about to nudge him again when his body was wracked with shaking. Bulma watched his body contort and listened painfully as he threw up the meager contents of his belly. She rested her forehead on his shoulder blade supportively. After the dry heaves had subsided, he managed to roll heavily onto his back.

"Cut it out in there," someone hollered, giving the cart a good whack. The concussion shook Bulma's brain and vision, but she fought through it.

"Vegeta," she pled softly.

"There are four of them," he announced roughly, startling her. "Two driving the cart. One riding alongside. Another...flying."

"Zarbon," she muttered darkly. "How do you know?"

"I can hear them." Even though he was responding to her questioning, Vegeta didn't seem lucid at all. His eyes were half-mast and his raspy speech was slurred.

"What's wrong with you?" She took him in, dread pooling in her belly.

"Ki...suppressors. Make me...sick."

"You and me both, buddy...Hey! You mean...Oh. Well, I'm glad that's all it is. What are we going to do? You're not capable of fighting right now, I'm cuffed, and I'm not worth squat in a fight!"

"Just...talk their heads off or something." He let out a few wracking laughs and then curled back onto his side, moaning.

"Oh, Vegeta," she lamented, her lips brushing against his shirt. "This isn't good." She trembled quietly. If only there was something she could do. Vegeta certainly wasn't offering up any advice.

The cart came jerking to a stop, and she heard the hum of voices a ways off.

"Nine more. He's...selling us," he mumbled.

"What?" She began frantically pulling at her binds. "What can I do?"

"They're..._Eeyuris_...Keep a low profile."

"You got it," she promised.

A look of determination settled firmly over Bulma's dusty, swollen face. She'd have to be smart. She wouldn't be able to fight or resist a single one of them. If she could endure until she could outsmart them-which was simply a test of time-that's what it took to keep her and Vegeta alive. Vegeta was an asset. She needed him to make a getaway. She was going to have to find some way to deactivate whatever tech was wreaking havoc on his system and restraining his power, so that he could lend a hand. Until then, she was marooned.

Footsteps approached the cart and the cover was whipped off. Several hooded faces peered down at them. Bulma tried to steady her rapidly beating heart.

"I told you she's exotic," Zarbon chimed, beaming down at her.

Bulma's blood ran cold.

"Sixty thousand crystarium and no more. We can't even breed the woman, and the man is just short of a liability."

"You'll come to no harm by him," Zarbon assured them. "The ki suppressors have complete control. Sixty thousand is nothing to gain Zojeerma-Yarowmeen's favor."

The _Eeyuris_ seemed to mull it over. Finally, one gave a sharp nod and called out for two men to take control of the cart.

As the _Eeyuris_ busied themselves with preparing their pack animal for the cart, Zarbon glided up to them with a syrupy smile.

"Why?" Bulma dared, her voice cracking as terror coursed through her.

"Vegeta owes me this." His smile contorted and deformed into a deep scowl. "He took my life from me, my lover, my career, my wealth. Without...his Lordship...I am _nothing_," he whispered madly. "I've had to scrape just to survive," he snarled. "_Bounty hunting_ just to survive. Now the little monkey, that _thorn in my side_," he screeched, "will meet his end. But not before he sinks as low as he can go." He shuddered. "Tell him I look forward to it. With the money earned off your corpses, I'm finally getting out of this hell so I can live how I deserve to live. In splendor!"

"You deserve this hell, Zarbon," Bulma spat. "For once you're free of that ugly lizard's expectations, and you can't even stop crying! Vegeta is a hundred times more of a man than you are," she declared harshly.

Zarbon's eyes dulled as he caressed his braid. "I killed the Monkey Prince and his mate. I've avenged you. Please forgive me," he prayed softly.

"You couldn't even bring Vegeta down without ki suppressors," she fumed.

Zarbon struck her hard enough that she slid across the cart, spilling against the back wall and knocking her head against the wood hard enough to fall into darkness, but not before she heard Vegeta's rough, unhinged laughter.

* * *

A/N: Hey, erry body! I hope everyone is doing well! I know this is another short chapter, but is that so bad? And now you have something to read while you're avoiding doing the dishes.

Thank you so much for the reviews and well wishes! For those of you who comment faithfully after every chapter, I just want to take you out to dinner, get a little tipsy with you, and giggle about all the bad hair in DBZ. Thank you to those readers who have stuck with me. This is my first fan fic ever, and the first time I've written anything that isn't academic in years. I feel like I'm getting a little better with each chapter, and I hope it shows.

I also just want to credit author Caprice 6 for inventing "crystallite" as a means of exchange in the BxV universe.

Ciao, for now!


	8. What's Missing Is What's Plenty

Disclaimer: I disclaim it.

__What's Missing Is What's Plenty_

"_What's missing is..._

_some care once denied _

_now dissolved inside_

_what's plenty is_

_one god_

_six tongues_

_five breaths_

_four lungs_

_what's rhythm is..._

_steps taken, lips kissing_

_new harmony on an awesome scale_

_meat against meat_

_under sail"_

_Bonnie "Prince" Billy_

* * *

Bulma kneeled on the cool white sand, surveying the stars as they flickered, hung against the deep black sky. She shut her eyes against them as the breeze ruffled her hair and caressed her face teasingly. Her fingers twitched behind her back. Dogs bayed behind her as the _Eeyuris_ unpacked their things, the sleepy camp waking slowly as the first burnt orange fires of dawn lit the horizon. Vegeta lay in a heap beside her. The binds on his wrists were really doing a number on him. He was a fighter, in his bones, running along in his blood; he would normally be giving consciousness and a battle his all. That he couldn't meant the ki suppressors were doing some seriously dirty work on his nervous system. She glanced at them with loathing as two _Eeyuris_ approached them. As she turned to receive them with as much dignity as she could muster, she caught Vegeta's eye. He was staring at her blankly. She stared back, the southerly wind ruffling her hair.

"Don't worry," she murmured solidly. "I'll take care of this."

He just continued to stare.

The _Eeyuris_ bent and hoisted him up by this armpits, hauling him away.

"Where are you taking him?" Bulma snapped, alarmed.

The _Eeyuris_ didn't answer, only continued dragging him across the sand towards the camp.

Bulma worked to slow her galloping pulse. They wouldn't hurt him, she reassured herself, not if they had so much money invested in him. She watched them disappear in the darkness, her chest tight.

An _Eeyuris_ shoved her shoulder, barking at her to rise. Bulma scowled and managed to stand up fumblingly. The _Eeyuris_ ripped her capsule case off her thigh, sliced the rope at her ankles and made short work of the rope at her wrists, although he gave her no time for relief as he pressed the same knife against her throat.

"If you have any plans for escape, bury them in the sand. There is no one but us for miles. Try anything still, and your mate falls," he threatened, pressing the blade deeper into her neck. She felt a quick, sharp pain and then wet, trickling down her collar. She gulped, making the knife sink even deeper.

"Yes," she answered hoarsely. "But what are your plans for us?"

"You will help the women work until the Gourd Moon."

She frowned at his term of phrase. Full moon?

"What then?"

She met with his silence. Understanding there was something he wasn't telling her, she pressed from another side. "What about my companion?"

"He does his own work, too." He cuffed the back of her head. "Ask no more questions."

Bulma was getting pretty fed up with these _Eeyuris_ already. She glowered and held her head high as another Eeyuris approached her. Only this one was dressed in a shapeless, sooty gray robe and veil, unlike the men's khaki, close-fitting robe and pant. The new one bowed to the man, who ignored it and turned on his heel, following the _Eeyuris_ who took off with Vegeta.

"Follow me," commanded a soft tenor, turning and shuffling toward a large tent. Bulma followed, observing the camp in the gray morning light. She listed, tripping over her own feet, and frowned. Her vision was obstructed by a creeping blackness around the edges, too, and she was worried she was nursing a concussion.

The figure, its gender hidden in the folds of the robe, led her into a tent, where two other figures in gray hovered over a long, wood burning stove. A small figure hovered in the corner, clutching a broom.

"You will start the laundry," a firm, feminine voice came from the robes, peeling back the veil to reveal a worn, gaunt face. "Breakfast is at dawn. Men eat first. After breakfast, you will wash up. Then we sweep camp for snakes. After that, we will skin and cure the meat the men bring back to camp. We then prepare lunch and wash dishes, launder clothes, beat out the men's prayer rugs. When the sun is five fingers from the horizon, we begin supper. After the tent is tidy, we go to bed."

"That's a huge to do list," Bulma announced, shocked.

"You're lucky you're an alien, or you'd be on your knees after a hard day's work, as well," one of the women snarled.

The first woman hushed her. "_Eeyuris_ men are sacred to Zojeerma-Yarowmeen. They give us life in our wombs. They allow us life outside of it."

"Without you, men couldn't help you make life. Without the miracle that is your body, you couldn't carry or bear a child. Without your strength, you couldn't complete this ridiculous laundry list every day," Bulma contested.

"Women are born flawed. It's with the men's blessing that we are able to work for redemption," she lectured in her toneless voice.

"Why are you educating her, Rauwen? It's not like she will be staying with us for good," the other woman chided her bitterly.

There was a heavy silence as Bulma began feeling the now familiar wave of apprehension. "Wait, what do you mean? Where will I be going?"

Rauwen only pivoted and gestured at Bulma to follow. Glancing back at the women's rough, tanned faces, their glares framed by heavy eyebrows, she followed Rauwen out the back tent flap. Rauwen led her to another tent a few paces away, where a wooden tub sat.

This was to be one of many lessons for Bulma in the following days. Bent over the tub, she scrubbed and thrashed the Eeyuris clothes in the stale water, water which she had painstakingly hauled from the well and poured into the tub, ringing the clothes dry and hanging them on the twine line at the back of camp. The lye in the soap dried her hands out, and before long, her knuckles cracked and bled. She was careful to keep the robes clean of any blood stains. Then she was escorted to the edge of camp with a dull machete to sweep the camp of snakes. Finding one curled languidly under a thorny bush, she at first let out a small shriek, and then stalled. She didn't want to kill the poor creature, until Rauwen appeared behind her, pinned the now spitting snake to the ground by its neck with the handle of a broom, and hacked its head clean off, eyes meeting Bulma's as she picked up the two halves of the limp body to burn. Then they hurried into the big tent, where the men had arrived, already dumping lifeless, still animals onto the sand before them. In horror, she watched as the women began skinning the creatures, pulling the skin over the heads, slicing the bellies open and hauling the guts out. After one of the women barked at her to get to work, Bulma sunk to her knees, grimacing, and began fastidiously pulling the guts out of what looked like a fox. When the animals were only skin and bones, the women went to work rubbing salt rock into the brown muscle, and then hauled the carcasses to a nearby tent to hang on a hook to store. Bulma's arms and legs shook as she tried over and over to loop the beast onto the hook, its dead weight taxing. Finally, it sunk cleanly onto the hook, and Bulma sighed heavily, wiping sweat from her brows.

When Bulma sarcastically asked why the women weren't also washing their pack animals down, she was informed that the Saiyeths, too, were sacred, and the women weren't allowed to touch them.

By the long day's end, Bulma was worn thin and dead tired. For better or for worse, she was too tired to worry long about her predicament, her aching head, her cracked and bleeding hands, her raw wrists and ankles, or even Vegeta's well being. After the men had filled their bellies and filed out of the tent, the women shoveled down the remaining stew, scrubbed the kitchen, and then disappeared one by one to their own tents. When the kitchen was clean, Rauwen led Bulma out the door.

"You will be sleeping with the children. I have robes for you to wear. It's not appropriate for you to wear that while in supplication."

"Supplicating!? What exactly are you atoning for? You should be worshipped for all the work that you do," Bulma exclaimed resentfully.

"That's not respectful," Rauwen said firmly, but gently. "This isn't like your home."

"No, it's not. There are many women there whose work and effort and choices and feelings are valued."

"There's an old adage which says _Eeyuris_ women aren't only born flawed, but with a stone for a heart. Feelings are not the same to us."

"Only because you cannot afford to hurt," Bulma whispered.

Rauwen, with haunted eyes, dropped the robes into Bulma's arms. "Your veil must be on while you're outside or in a man's presence. Please do not speak to the children. Just sleep. I will wake you before dawn."

Bulma wanted to ask her more but kept her mouth shut, following the woman to the area that the women peed in, and then to the children's hut, where little sleeping bodies lay in a circle, snoring softly in the darkness. There was a rag on the floor boards where she was told to rest, and when Rauwen left her, Bulma achingly stripped off her boots and sprawled on the thin, pilled blanket. She stared up at the tent, vaguely thirsty. She was so exhausted she could only flutter her eyelids and ponder the colors behind them in the darkness. But right before she drifted into a heavy sleep, a little voice on her side broke the silence.

"Are you an alien?"

Bulma turned towards the child. The little girl in the corner of the kitchen. Even in the dark, Bulma could see she had startling gold eyes under thick dark brows, beautiful lips, and a thin, delicate nose. She was striking.

"I suppose I am," Bulma whispered, considering. She cleared her throat. "I'm not supposed to talk to you."

"That's because children are but styes in the eyes of Zojeerma-Yarowmeen. But I am often beat for not minding," the little girl informed her innocently. "I am not good at listening."

"Me, either," she chuckled lightly. She threw her arm over her eyes. "I'm surprised you get away with it."

"My mistress says it will come to a head once I get my first blood. Then the men will not tolerate me."

Bulma rolled over to face her, starkly perturbed at this child's merciless, dark reality.

"I'm sorry that it's like this for you. Not all girls are treated so cruelly in the galaxy."

"It's my fault, though, for being a girl, and a bad omen," she responded naively.

"No. No, it's not. That's what the men tell you to justify the way they treat you. The only thing a girl like you should be doing is catching fireflies, blowing bubbles, climbing trees."

The girls molten eyes were wide in the darkness. "That sounds unreal. It's too bad you can't take me home with you and show me fireflies," she said, stumbling over the word.

"Yes, it is too bad," Bulma murmured sincerely, settling on her back again to stare up at the inky blackness of the tent's peak.

"It's too bad they're going to feed you to Zojeerma-Yarowmeen. I wish you could stay here with me."

Bulma's eyes widened. There was that dread in the pit of her belly again.

"What is Zojeerma-Yarowmeen?"

"The Exalted One," the girl said, like Bulma was dumb. "He's the Lord of the Desert."

Everything hit her with painful clarity. Bulma ran her hands through her hair, gulping.

"I'm to be a sacrifice to a god?"

The little girl nodded timidly. "I shouldn't talk about him though. He doesn't like little children to talk about him."

"How horrible," Bulma commented, stupefied. Panicking, Bulma sat up abruptly. "What about my companion?"

The little girl nodded. "Zojeerma-Yarowmeen hasn't been gifting the men with children, and the _Eeyuris_ are dying out. It is said Zojeerma was a powerful warrior who landed on this planet with his mate, Yarowmeen, and created the Eeyuris to pastor this realm. The men say a sacrifice of an alien warrior and his mate can convince Zojeerma-Yarowmeen that they are dedicated to him. If they spill your blood on the Gourd Moon, the men will be blessed with children again."

Absently, Bulma realized Zarbon hadn't called in Vegeta's ransom to anyone out in space. He had, instead, heeded the call from the _Eeyuris_ and dumped Vegeta and Bulma into their laps. Why would he choose to hide Vegeta?

The little girl recoiled as they heard a noise outside the tent, but when nothing came of it, she sank back into the blankets, rubbing her eyes. Bulma did not have a blanket, and the desert night temperature was dropping rapidly. She tossed the robe Rauwen gave her over her legs.

"Please don't tell anyone I told you. I will be beat," the girl asked from the dark.

"Never," promised Bulma, rubbing her crossed arms anxiously.

Two weeks. That's all she had before they were consumed by a god.

* * *

The days passed, and Bulma was no closer to a practical plan. Every morning, she told Vegeta out loud that she would take care of them. She tried finding satisfaction in keeping her head down, as Vegeta had advised her to do. And then, every morning, she scrubbed the _Eeyuris_ clothes and dishes, skinned and cured their meat, clumsily killed the poisonous snakes lingering too close to camp, and finally, sunk into an exhausted, anxious sleep each night. Her heavy robe and veil made her sweat more than the hot sun was already guilty of, and it took a lot of self control not to throw them off in defiance. But she had Vegeta's safety to care for. Things couldn't go on like this. Her and Vegeta's fate rested on her shoulders, and for once, she had _nothing_.

Until she stumbled over the storage tent.

Rauwen, which Bulma learned respectably meant "mother" in _Eeyuri_, had asked for her help with something before they prepared dinner, taking her to a tent a few dozen feet from the kitchen. As Bulma's eyes adjusted to the dark tent, her stomach dropped. Inside, were piles and piles of tech. And on top of a tower of it lay her capsule case.

Rauwen explained. "The men pick this stuff off of traders when they get stranded outside Tent City. None of it works. I'd like to clear this stuff out and use this tent for-"

"Rauwen!" Bulma protested. "Are you crazy!" Bulma plucked through the jumble, grabbing a few spare parts. "Rauwen," Bulma said seriously, leveling a gaze at her mistress who, in her own way, had been kind to her, in light of her alien-ness and expendability. "Rauwen, if you let me, I can build you things from these parts that will make your tasks easier. Think of, of machines that will wash your clothes quicker and cleaner. That will wash your dishes for you-"

"What are you talking about?" Rauwen snapped.

"Rauwen, I build tech on my planet. That's my job. If you just let me, I can put all this stuff to work for you," she encouraged. _And find something that can disable Vegeta's cuffs._

"That's enough. I don't want to hear it," Rauwen demanded harshly. "Did the men put you up to this? If you are trying to trick me-"

"No! Let me help you-"

"Silence! Go help the women make dinner. You are no longer permitted in here."

Bulma was crestfallen. Despondently, she stepped out of the tent. Vegeta was right. These people didn't want her enlightened help.

She could sneak into the tent tonight anyway.

Unfortunately, fate had other plans for her.

* * *

As Bulma loped into the tent to help with dinner, slicing into meat and desert onions with single minded thoughtlessness (_six more days, six more days_), she began to consider some of her most desperate ideas. Steal an animal, gather up Vegeta, cut down any _Eeyuris_ in her way...she'd break down into silent, dry sobs, seeing the plan as it was: full of holes, too vulnerable to trouble. She was no martial artist. She could see herself clunking through the dark, and if she wasn't hacked down then, she would be soon enough. How was she going to defend herself against men accustomed to killing? Escape men accustomed to the desert? How was she going to carry a Saiyan warrior, packed densely with muscle? There were too many what ifs. Bulma was at a loss.

Six days. Her only chance hinged on deactivating Vegeta's cuffs.

Maybe then, he would just stand up and stretch and say, "C'mon, Onna, let's blow this popsicle stand." Maybe it would be as easy as that, and they would stand up, and he would fly them back to the ship, and they would just take off...

"That's why they don't need him, he said. He's no warrior, he won't even put up a fight," she overhead one of the women saying. She turned her head emptily toward her.

"My husband said he won't eat. No warrior just lays down and dies. He thinks it was a foolish investment. They'll kill him before the sun rises," she informed the other woman smugly. "Some sacrifice."

"What did you say?" Bulma asked sharply, causing all of the women to jump as she put her knife down on the cutting board deliberately.

The woman sneered. "It's no business of yours, you alien slut-"

Bulma launched herself at the woman, tackling her to the floor and shaking her. "Tell me! What's going to happen?" She felt Rauwen's hands pulling at her, trying to dislodge her, but Bulma's grip was steadfast. "What's happening to him?" She interrogated.

"He's starving. They are going to slay him like the animal that he is. He is not fit to represent Zojeerma-"

Bulma let go of her roughly, knocking the woman's head on the floorboard, and turned toward Rauwen, who startled and fell back onto her haunches.

"Why didn't you tell me he wasn't eating?" Bulma cried out, her eyes gathering up frustrated, desperate tears. "Food is very important to a Saiyan's health! I can help him! He could die!"

"You aliens all deserve to die! Plundering our planet, displeasing-"

"Shut up!" Bulma yelled viscously. The woman's mouth clamped shut, but her brown eyes held a wary anger.

"Do you think you could get him to eat?" Rauwen asked cautiously. The other woman scoffed at her concern.

Bulma nodded.

"I will speak to my husband. Maybe he will find it favorable to maintain our camp's investment."

Bulma's head bobbed slightly in agreement, her eyes imploring Rauwen, who simply stood and began chopping desert squash like nothing had happened.

The younger woman took the cue and dislodged herself from Bulma's grip, turning back to her work station, casting Bulma a look of stinging malevolence. Bulma stood painfully and picked up her knife, listlessly.

"After all," Rauwen spoke, breaking the silence. "They are mates. Zojeerma-Yarowmeen prizes mates above all else. Zojeerma and Yarowmeen were mates, who held each other up in turns when the flash flood descended on the realm. It is better that she take care of him, in supplication, to satisfy Zojeerma-Yarowmeen more at the Gourd Moon."

Bulma chopped unseeing. Vegeta was dying, and she was helpless to stop it.

* * *

She was surprised by Rauwen, who, after they had eaten and cleaned up, had pulled Bulma aside as she walked dolefully to her tent.

"I want you to do something for me," she said.

Bulma stared at her cautiously. She remembered the last request Rauwen had made of her.

"I want you to go to that tent."

Bulma's eyes widened. She knew which one she was talking about.

"I want you to build these things you said you could help us."

Rauwen looked at her carefully, like she was administering some kind of test.

"I've also talked to my husband about your mate. He is allowing you one visit. He wants you to convince your mate to eat, or he dies. He has not decided your own fate, should he succumb to his weakness." Bulma nodded, understanding what wasn't said. She would either die with him, for nothing, not even an alien world's stupid fanatical cause, or she could be stuck out here forever, serving men who valued her less than an animal, guilt ripping her apart over Vegeta's death until she died, an expatriate.

"First feed your mate. There is an extra bowl on the table," she gestured back at the kitchen tent. "He is in the Exalted's. Then I will meet you at the tent. I am to oversee you." Bulma barely got out a thank you before she was high tailing it to the kitchen, picking up the cold bowl and bustling to the place of devotion for the _Eeyuris_. Rauwen had done her a kindness that she couldn't forget. How many times had she daydreamed about making her way here? How many times had she stopped herself, in fear for Vegeta's life? This couldn't go on any longer. Vegeta was being killed nine ways to Sunday and if she didn't take a risk, it was going to be her fault, regardless. She had to act quickly.

As she neared the doorway, she was overcome with butterflies. Suddenly feeling shy, she pushed the curtain aside and walked in hesitantly. There were rows and rows of candles lit in the mud house, and crudely woven, storytelling tapestries covering the walls. Beaten base metal and rock carving figures pantomimed on a devotional slab of rock in the back.

And, in front of it, lay a bruised, filthy, lean Vegeta.

She walked swiftly to him, throwing off her veil, setting the bowl carelessly on the rock slab and falling to her knees beside him. He was pale, the skin beneath his eyes was dark and puffy. His skin had a sickly sheen to it. She felt a tear slip down her nose and she touched his sallow skin delicately, finally breaking down into sobs and cradling his head in her lap.

"I'm so sorry, Vegeta," she sobbed. "I've failed you." She touched the thick coarse hair behind his ear, slid her fingertips down his throat, and then gripped his shoulder. In this dwelling place of a god that desired them dead, she pressed her lips against his forehead, her tears falling into his defiant hair.

"I have failed you," he contested hoarsely. She gaped, taking his head in her hands and peering at him.

"Vegeta?" She whispered reverently.

"I failed...to be the strongest under Frieza. I failed to take his life...at avenging my people. I failed to be...wary of an attack against Zarbon. I have failed too many times to deserve to live."

"No! Don't say that! You're judging yourself too harshly. You have always persevered, when others would have just laid down to die. You can't give up now," she pled. "Not when you have so much to look forward to. Beating up...Ka-Kakarot...tasting my mother's tiramisu...yelling at me for not fixing the gravity room at an impossible speed..." _Not when I'm falling in love with you._

"I regret...I regret not kissing you within an inch of your life, that day you came home...covered in snow. Erase everyone but me from your memories that night...in your, in your lab," he murmured, his eyes downcast. "I should have at least made you mine before we died."

"You stupid Prince," she choked out, lying down beside him and pressing herself flush against him. "You are obviously out of it if you're acting like a gentleman. You can make love to me just as soon as you stand up for yourself. I need you whole. I need you stubborn and resilient," she pled into his chest. She wrapped one hand into his hair and laced her fingers in his own. "I'm going to get us out of here. They're going to kill you if you don't eat. I think I can uncuff you soon, but I need you to survive until then. Eat, regain some of your energy."

"Bah. Energy..." he rumbled scathingly. "I am so much more powerful than these worms, but snap a piece of metal onto my wrists, and I am nothing."

"They _are_ worms, and I need your help stomping them!" She scowled. "I need the Prince of All Saiyans."

"The Prince died...with his planet."

Bulma felt like she was definitely at the end of her rope. "I need Vegeta, that cocky asshole who came to _my_ planet and laughed as he took down every one of my friends! I need that price who punched poor Gohan in the gut for just being so gosh darned cute and who laughed at the Nameks wondering where their brothers were. I need that total jerk who knocked me on my ass instead of politely declining my romantic interest!"

Vegeta let out a few sharp laughs and finally looked at her, his black gaze a little delirious.

"Your Prince of Assholes," he smiled, "won't make a clown out of himself anymore."

A deep frown settled over her face. "You're abandoning me. Again."

"Why stand by you as your man if I am not worthy?"

"You are a fool." Her name calling had no effect on him. "Stubborn as always, and, like usual, totally back assward!"

"I will save your ass or die trying," she seethed harshly into his face, her gaze burning, "and you will spend the rest of your life feeling like a fool because a human woman bested you." He gazed up at her, but she was beyond frustrated now, standing up and jerking the veil back over her face.

"If you failed anyone," she grit as she strode out, "it's yourself."

* * *

Bulma marched out of the hut and made a beeline for the storage tent. She kind of stumbled upon Rauwen, who was sewing quietly outside the door. Bulma was glad her face was concealed. She didn't want Rauwen asking questions.

"The machines that can help with dishes and clothes. I would like to see you make them." They moved inside together, removing their veils.

There was something going on, and Bulma couldn't put her finger on it. She started rifling through parts and glanced back up at Rauwen, who had drew inward, a troubled expression on her serious face.

"What is your name?" She asked Bulma rashly, as if it were a madcap question.

"Bulma," Bulma softly replied, puzzled.

"Bulma, my daughter is...the last in a line of children born with an ungodly condition." Rauwen rushed to kneel beside her, placing her hand on Bulma's knee importantly. "No more babies since her. From me, or anyone. The men believe she is a sign. She is a girl, foremost. Secondly, she has golden eyes." Pieces clicked as Bulma recalled the young girl in the corner with the vibrant eyes, daring to talk to her in the dark. "The eyes of an omen. The men believe Zojeerma-Yarowmeen is displeased with us women. They would kill us, and some they have, if it didn't mean the end of _Eeyuris_. We are not working hard enough. Not quiet enough. Not pleasing enough," she blushed. "There are only so many of us left. This camp is small, but the other camps are doing just as poorly. We...need help," she confessed, uncertainly.

"I would be happy to make tech that can make your lives easier," Bulma affirmed.

"I do not think a sacrifice is what Zojeerma-Yarowmeen needs," Rauwen said harshly, gripping Bulma's knee. "I think He is ailing because She is suffocating. You are right, we work very hard for the men who abuse us. They separate us from our children!" Rauwen's voice thickened and cracked, like dough over-kneaded. "But it's when you showed up, looking my husband in the eyes defiantly, reminding me we are two parts of a whole, that I knew you were our true omen. A sign telling me our women are dying, and we have to stand up for ourselves because no one else will." She vehemently held Bulma's gaze, nearly spitting the words at Bulma just so that she wouldn't choke and die on them. "Make me these machines. And take what you need. Tomorrow is a new day."

Bulma measured her grim ferocity and put her hand on Rauwen's.

"If regime change is what you want," she said firmly, "than I would be happy to help."

"The _Eeyuris_ cannot survive while their women are being smothered. It's a disgrace. Tomorrow, when the moon rises before dusk, the men will get stupidly drunk as they begin preparations for your sacrifice." Rauwen looked at her uneasily then, but Bulma nodded, showing that she knew. Rauwen continued. "The men may likely kill your mate, or at least have their fun with him. Many of them are not...civil when intoxicated. And they forget about the purity of our race." Bulma paled a little but nodded for her to go on. "Then is your chance. The women will reign tomorrow at midnight, in time for the Gourd Moon, reminding the men that we are fighters, too. Or we will at least die by our own choice. For your mate and your safety, you need to be out of here before then. We cannot protect you."

"Right."

"We need a lot of healing, I think," Rauwen confided, mostly to herself. Bulma was reminded of Vegeta's taxed, candlelit form.

"And you will time to do it."

It was a promise to Vegeta she wasn't backing out on.

* * *

Bulma walked back to her tent in the bright light of the setting gibbous moon. It was late, and she'd at least like an hour of sleep before she began her last day in the _Eeyuris_ camp. She fingered the tools in her pocket.

She walked carefully into the children's tent, not wanting to wake the half dozen kids sleeping restlessly.

She laid down stiffly, taking the veil off but leaving her robes on for warmth. She couldn't wait to take a shower. The women here had thick, coarse hair, and didn't need to wash it very often, but Bulma's fine blue hair lay matted, itching against her head. There was no grooming or beautifying in camp, except twice weekly, when the women got to at least rinse their hair and privates. Bulma was feeling like a dirt ball. Where once that may have been enough to send her into an uproar, she was filled only with a quiet, implacable determination to see a bubble bath once again.

As she was beginning to question whether or not she would even get any sleep, she shifted onto her side and saw the little golden eyed girl looked at her sleepily but intently. Bulma gave her a small smile.

"Soon you will feel love," Bulma whispered, tiredly.

"Zojeerma-Yarowmeen doesn't want me," she yawned. "I am forsaken."

"Things change," Bulma commented simply. "Never give up hope."

* * *

It was hard for Bulma to focus on her chores. It was like every time she turned around, her eyes met Rauwen's in paranoid camaraderie. The other women too seemed ill at ease, restless. Though the men seemed to suspect nothing. They didn't bother talking to their women anyway, and they were as transparent as any savage, anyway. She felt that if they knew, they would have nipped it in the bud by now. The women were still breathing, and that was all the comfort in their relative safety that she needed. Her tools and her capsule case rubbed against her thigh encouragingly.

At breakfast and dinner, she had eaten what little she could get away with, and capsulized the rest. She knew Vegeta needed as much food as he could get, and although she was hoping for a quick flight to Tent City to get food, and an even quicker flight back to the ship, she wanted to be prepared. That was Vegeta's mantra, wasn't it? He was a man who kept all his cards up his sleeve. She couldn't imagine that an orphan like him who crawled up the ranks of Frieza's command could have gotten far without learning a thing or two about survival. She could learn a thing or two from him..._.But not from his corpse,_ she reminded herself bleakly.

After dinner, when Bulma was nearly trembling with anticipation, Rauwen released her, giving her a quick hug.

"Take care," she said into Bulma's hair. "Thank you for your gift to us."

"I wish I could give more." Bulma nodded toward the other women, who stood rigidly and silent behind her, as she turned out the door.

It was nearly dusk, and she could hear the men hooting and hollering on the other side of camp in the men's tent. Bellies full and bloodshed near, she imagined that they were quite stupid right now. As she passed a tent, chewing her lip in worry, a man's rough hands pulled her inside, clamping her wrists painfully behind her back as he grinned down at her toothlessly. Bulma's heart jumped into her throat. He backhanded her hard across her cheek, sending her sprawling. He kneed in her back before turning her over, leering down at her as she laid gasping on her back, stars in her vision, her cheek and back smarting.

_No, no, no, I've come too close!_

He was fumbling with the button on his pants, his robe getting in the way of his stumbling fingers as Bulma's mind raced.

That's when she saw it-a short sword hanging from his belt loop. As he finally unbuttoned the last button, Bulma closed her eyes and summoned her courage, sending a quick prayer to Vegeta. As quickly as she could, she drew the sword from its crude leather sheath and plunged it into his stomach. Bulma's mouth hung agape as his blood spilled out of him, christening her. Shocked, the man croaked out a denial, feeling dumbly at the wound, until he fell backwards. Bulma watched in slow motion as he open ed his mouth to yell for help. Without thinking, she yanked the sword out of his belly, which gave a sick, sloppy disapproval, and straddled him, slamming it into his chest. His eyes stared up at her, vacantly.

Quickly, she rolled off of him in revulsion and lost her dinner in the corner. Her mind was dumbly blank, but her heart was beating up a frenzy. She had never, ever expected to be in the situation where a man's life rested in her hands...and she chose his demise.

Wiping her wet mouth on the back of her hand, she stumbled over to the door flap and peered outside. No one was around. It looked like no one had heard their scuffle, thankfully.

She gripped the sword. Although she knew she couldn't take any chances, she ran recklessly to the Exalted's, screeching to a halt once inside. There, to her relief, lay Vegeta. She whisked the tools out of her pocket, kneeled beside him, and got to work, racing against time. Her still trembling, sweaty hands kept slipping on the locks, and it was hard to see which tool was which. Sweat dripped down her face, stinging her eyes and running sourly into her mouth, until she angrily slammed the tool into the last hole and twisted. With a click, the cuffs fell benignly from Vegeta's wrist to clatter onto the floor.

Vegeta's eyes snapped open. With one, firm nod of approval, Zojeerma-Yarowmeen christened Vegeta a black hole. All of the energy of the desert began vacuuming into his body in a torrent of life around him. His muscles bulged and he roared as his body, in reaction to the stress of the ki suppressors, violently sought balance to his ki.

The mud hut trembled, cracked, and broke into bits, chunks flying in a cyclone around them as he powered up to tremendous heights.

There was a reason he was this drained. He turned toward the sound of _Eeyuris_ men and took a step in their direction, raising his hand, a ball of blue energy roiling against his palm.

A small white hand closed around his wrist, and he looked down at the slight, robed figure beside him. In the cold glow of his energy, he could see the blood splashed across her, her torn, dirty fingernails. The force of his energy didn't seem to dissuade her.

Just as she crooned his name, her feminine, familiar smell hit his senses, and the animal inside him drew comfort from it...only for his energy to stutter and flicker out and his knees to give way.

"Vegeta!" She cried, kneeling beside him. "Fuck!" She cried out in anguish.

She walloped his shoulder, shook his face frenetically. "You have to wake up." She gripped his shirt in her fists and called out to him, finally beating wildly on his chest. She was at the end of her rope, her sanity suffering and fracturing under the sleeplessness, assault, hunger, distress of the last two weeks. In the back of her head, a voice kept telling her to keep calm and pull herself together, but she was too engrossed in the lifeless body beside her.

A familiar, small voice called out to her.

"Hold on," the little girl urged her. "I'll get a Saiyeth. Just hold on!" The diminutive figure raced off, Bulma blinking at her through a fog of despair.

It wasn't long before the sounds of fighting reached her, and she began to worry for the girl. The little girl came rushing back, what felt like forever later, leading a saddled Saiyeth.

"How am I going to get him on?" She asked the girl obtusely. The little girl shook her head helplessly. Bulma stared at her and then at Vegeta, who lay unmoving in the rubble.

"If I never have to see you knocked out again, it would once too many," she snarled at him.

Bulma bent down and, with all her strength, drug Vegeta over to the Saiyeth, wincing as his head knocked against bricks of broken clay. When she was right up on it, she lopped his arm around her shoulder and, with all her might and stubborn determination, stood up to carry his weight. Her knees nearly buckled and her quads protested jerkily.

"Vegeta," she grunted. "Help..."

Vegeta grabbed weakly onto the reigns and pulled himself, cruelly slow, onto the Saiyeths back, Bulma pushing from behind. Once he was on, clutching the reigns to avoid slipping, she helped him get his foot out from under him and to dangle on the other side. Finally satisfied that he was firmly on, Bulma ripped off her veil and turned to the little girl. The sounds of fighting were drawing too close for comfort.

"Come with us," she said, surprising herself. "Please. You'll like it on Earth. You'll have an easy life. You can go to school, play with other children. There will be no adults who want to hurt you."

"I can't," she whined, her eyes wide with fright. "My mistress is here. I can't abandon her."

"I can't speak for your mother," Bulma declared, "but, if your mother doesn't...survive...she'd want you to be safe." She owed her that. Rauwen's serious, lined face surfaced in her vision.

The girl shook her head frantically. "I can't. I can't leave her! My brothers and sisters were killed because of me! She was punished because of my eyes. I can't leave her alone."

Bulma's heart sank, and wiping once more at her eyes, she nodded.

"I respect your choice. Stay strong!" She urged her. "Don't let anyone walk all over you." Glancing at Vegeta, she uttered, "Only then will you find love."

The little girl nodded, and Bulma waved goodbye.

"Follow the desert mouse tail!" She informed Bulma, pointing to a small constellation cluster. The little girl hit the Saiyeths haunches and hollered at it, and it lurched forward, making Bulma a little sick. Clutching the reigns from behind Vegeta's prone form, the Saiyeth led them across the star strewn desert, toward Tent City.


	9. Gemini Ascendent

Disclaimer: What would I do if I owned it? Crack my whip and get them writing in more Vegeta and Bulma, of course.

_Gemini Ascendent

Bulma twisted her dress in her hands as she fought to remain awake. The sharp afternoon sun, filtered through the coarse basket weave curtains, fell across Vegeta's sleeping form. His chest lifted and fell with a slow, deep rhythm. He hadn't moved an inch since the young man she paid dumped his body onto the bed. Although she didn't want to let on to how helpless they were, and as paranoid that someone may recognize them and try to recapture them as she was, she just couldn't move Vegeta's dead weight herself. She had barred the doors and shoved the room's only chair under the knob, electing to sit beside the mattress on the ashy floorboards as if in vigil.

Upon reaching the city, she had led the Saiyeth through the maze of shops to the befuddlement of the early morning traders. There was a cluster of young boys huddled outside a deli whom she called out to for directions to the nearest hotel. Vegeta hadn't budged, and they still needed food. As the young boy led her through draped alleys, her Saiyeth's girth barely squeezing through, he had asked her if she were looking to get rid of the creature. Although she was reluctant to give up their only mode of transportation, she was even more opposed to being spotted. Riding a Saiyeth through the city, unaccompanied by an _Eeyuris_, was beyond unusual. And although _Eeyuris_ didn't typically enter Tent City, she was still loathe to cross one and be questioned, should she make the trip across the desert to the ship on one of their Saiyeths. And who knew if Zarbon or any of his lackeys were still on planet? So, with some hesitance, Bulma sold the creature for a few thousand _olemi_, the cash equivalent of crystarium. With it, she paid for a room and forked over a few bills to the man who lugged Vegeta into their room, who nearly buckled under his weight and scurried away once pocketing her cash. Since then, Bulma had simply sat and observed Vegeta, concerned at any moment he may just quit breathing. He was too quiet, a haunting deja vu of the gravity room accident.

Bulma fought tired, heavy eyes. That night-hell, the last two weeks-an agonizing restlessness had controlled her. Hyper vigilant and high strung until she had closed the door against the world, she was now coming down from her distress. Her body threatened to crash, and soon.

Just as her eyes drooped and she pondered the play of light behind her eyelids, there was a rustle from the bed, and her eyes snapped open. Vegeta was struggling to sit up, stifling a moan. Bulma moved quickly to help him, suddenly wide awake.

Vegeta sucked in air and rolled his shoulders, working out underused muscles. His eyes flicked over the room, assessing. One open window, a curtain hanging limply, blocking the desert heat. One door, a rickety chair propped underneath the knob. If whoever restraining him thought that would hold him, they were in for a deliciously rude awakening, Vegeta thought. A sweet rage swelled inside him. His fists clenched as he sneered. Zarbon and the nomads would pay. They would _all_ be subject to his refined taste for revenge.

A soft hand settled in his palm. "Vegeta?" A soft, worn feminine voice beckoned, cajoled him. The beast inside him turned its grizzly maw toward the sound. Who dared put a hand on him? They would rue the day they crossed the Prince of Saiyans.

The woman's dirty, concerned face was marred by a mottled bruise at her temple and an angry red blush across one cheek. Her cracked fingers, nails dirty and torn, curled in his palm. She gazed at him in concern. Bulma.

"Where are we?" He asked hoarsely.

"Tent City. In an inn on the east side."

He frowned, running his hand over his face and through his hair. "What...happened?"

She glimpsed the confusion in his eyes, heard the uncertainty in his tone. "How much do you remember?"

Sand grating against his cheek as he was dragged through the _Eeyuris_ camp. Boots laying into his side, hacking laughter as _Eeyuris_ spittle clung to his cheek. Candlelight flickering on teal as Bulma's pale face turned from grief to anger and she walked out on him. His body trembling, hollowed out, as fiery energy rushed to fill him up before the starry sky became obscured by blackness.

His eyes slid to the floor and he grit his teeth. "Enough. Not much."

"Those cuffs are deplorable," she muttered.

"Of course they are. They suppress ki, a warrior's life force. They were one of Frieza's pet projects once he discovered there was someone unwilling to brownnose him."

Bulma stared at him quietly, trying to suppress her horror at his confession. "Zarbon sold us to the _Eeyuris_," she explained, redirecting the conversation delicately, "who paid good money just to sacrifice us to their god. We were captive in their camp about two weeks. They held you in their...church. With the help of some _Eeyuris_ women, we were able to escape."

He scrutinized her. He sensed there was a lot more she wasn't telling him. He noticed she still wore the _Eeyuris_ covering, and his eyes narrowed. It was stiff with dried blood.

"What happened to you, Onna?"

Bulma's eyes became haunted and she glanced to the side. "I did what I had to do," she replied thinly.

His siren had undergone a sea change. Who was this pensive, dirty angel kneeling beside him?

All the rage he had suffered in the last year-his long withheld, incendiary hatred for Frieza; his contempt, muddled by grudging admiration, for Kakarot; his irritation at this whole, stinking planet, never mind Earth-yearned to crush the _Eeyuris_' heads under his boots and punch a hole straight through Zarbon's pretty face. And for some reason, Bulma's appearance only kindled his appetite for destruction. He was tired of being one upped. He was DONE with suffering humiliation at the hands of inferiors. He hadn't escaped Frieza's claws just to suffer in someone else's. A low growl was undulating through the room, and an answering call howled in his blood.

"You saved me," he snapped at Bulma. Her eyes widened fractionally. "You had no right."

"What? Are you serious?" She asked in disbelief, her eyes narrowing into slits and her jaw squaring. "You were completely debilitated by the ki cuffs. You were hardly conscious the entire two weeks." Her voice rose. "When I got them off you, you passed out! Was I just supposed to leave you there?"

There were so many emotions tugging at him. He felt all this hatred for anyone or anything that challenged him, including the woman. She occupied the same foolish, soft hearted territory Kakarot did. Like Kakarot, she just couldn't let him live or die like a warrior should. On the other hand, he felt a surge of pride for this woman who, despite all odds, evaded and possibly even took down the _Eeyuris_ while protecting him. He leashed his indignation. _She_ deserved _his_ protection. At the heart of this frenzied, curdled storm of outrage was his humiliation at not being able to fight for this woman. He was livid, but the tactician in him reminded him that if he just bided his time, his opportunity to release the Prince of all Saiyans in all of his bloody glory would be realized.

"We will get what need here, and then I will destroy this mud ball."

"No!"

He glanced up at her angrily. "What?! I'm trying to avenge us, woman!"

"There are women on this planet who deserve to live the rest of their lives in peace. The _Eeyuris_ women revolted after we escaped, Vegeta. Let them have their own justice."

He growled, and then folded his arms petulantly. "You're a softy. You have no concept of pride."

"My pride was just as injured as yours, Vegeta," she snarled. "The difference is I don't cut those down who blink twice at me. I roll with the punches, because that shows the most power and self control."

They glared at each other, the tension palpable, until Bulma stood.

"We need food, a bath, and clothes. Do you need a doctor? I didn't dare call for one," she asked him tonelessly, obviously cross with him.

He shook his head roughly and glowered up at her. Her eyes flashed over him, piercing azure fire, as she turned away and walked to the bathroom. The beast in him again roared deafeningly to the surface, a drum beat thumping through his skull. She wouldn't hurt him, but she would never back down from a challenge by him, wielding her mouth and courage with a natural grace many warriors would envy. There wasn't another woman-or man-like her in the universe. He rested his arms on his knees and scrutinized the floor in confusion. The beast in him wanted to lock her in a cage and taunt her just to observe her in all her furious glory. He wanted to kill men for her. He wanted to sink his teeth into her flesh and fill her up to the hilt. He wanted her teeth on his neck, too. But a part of him, the rotten, icy, malformed psychotic in him, wanted to put her in her place because she dared to provoke him. Instead of celebrating her and protecting her, it wanted to destroy her in a wave of violence that obliterated anyone who challenged him or glimpsed his weakness. His twisted pride couldn't stand her dismissal of it.

He let out a gruff growl and stood, surprising himself as he swayed. He felt achy, hollow. He couldn't remember the last time he ate. He caught a whiff of urine and grimaced, stripping off his clothes swiftly. Pulling out his crystarium card and tossing it on the bed, he thrust his clothes away and incinerated them with a small blast of ki. He made his way to the bathroom, a tiny room with only a toilet and sink. To the left inside the room was a room barely larger than the size of a closet with a small window, and as he emptied his bladder, his body struggling to remember the practice, he glanced in. His breath caught.

Bulma straightened from pumping water into the tub, her soft muscles rippling under her white skin. In the center of her back was a broad, mottled bruise. As she turned her head to see him, he saw the flaky blood painting her flat belly a rusty red, the side of her face purpled. Her hair lay limp and frizzy between her shoulder blades, and he could see blood crusted at the back of her head. Stripped of all her clothes, he could see her hands, face, and feet were a gritty brown, as though dipped in sand. She was magnificent.

He felt his cock jump at the swell of her buttocks, the lean angles of her back. She looked into his eyes and he could only stand naked before her. He realized with some trepidation that he didn't want her to see him as a warrior, or even a Saiyan. He just wanted her to view him as a man. In her gaze, he wanted to be something new. Not different, just whole. She deserved a whole man. That ruled Scarface out, but it ruled him out, too. A sour feeling settled in his gut.

The beast roared at the man, urging him to make her his. He could prove to her he was worthy. He could tie up his loose ends and then claim her in the Saiyan way.

His mesmerization broke when she stepped delicately into the bath, sinking into the water with a sigh. Dipping her head back, she ran her fingers through lank tresses. She grabbed the thin bar of soap on the edge of the tub, lathered her hands, and scrubbed at her face. She felt Vegeta's eyes on her, but for once, she was unconcerned. Let him watch. She had nothing to prove. The only person she owed anything at the moment was herself.

The soap was plucked from her hands and she opened her eyes, blinking in confusion. A few seconds later, she felt Vegeta's fingers descend into her hair, kneading her scalp with soapy fingers. Her eyelids lowered blissfully, and with only a little reluctance, she relaxed into his touch. When he was done lathering soap through her hair, he worked his way down, his fingertips a caress behind her ears, massaging the webbing between her fingers, rubbing the stiffness carefully out of her back. He soaped her chest, hands cooly grazing her nipples before moving onto her ribs. She cocked her knees, resting her ankles on the rim of the tub in repose, and he rubbed his thumbs into her sore feet, running them up her shins and scrubbing at her knees. He kneaded the soap into her thighs, and she tensed as she realized where he could only be headed. She glanced up at him then. He sat on his haunches, waiting patiently for permission. She leaned her head against his shoulder slowly in agreement. He lathered up his hands and quickly, deftly, washed her lower belly and core. He angled her chin up and kissed her lightly, then sat the soap down and rinsed his hands in the dirty water. As she sunk back into the bath, splashing water into her splayed, soapy hair, he grabbed the towel and handed it to her. She stepped out of the bath, quietly drying off, as he drained the bath, refilled it, and climbed in.

Wrapping the towel around her, she finally spoke, her voice smooth and restful. "What are we going to do about clothing?"

Vegeta dunked his head in and then flung it back, spraying water as his hair whipped behind him. "We'll just have to get it the old fashioned way."

"I have money."

"Where did you get money?"

"I sold a Saiyeth."

Vegeta cocked an eyebrow but didn't ask, scrubbing at his smooth chest instead. He didn't want to talk anymore about the last two weeks, and he got the feeling she didn't, either.

Suddenly, her eyes brightened. "I know how!"

To his dismay, worry bolted through him.

"I'll be right back!"

She tucked the towel loosely around her chest and worked to open the front door. As she expected, a few young men congregated across the street, smoking.

"Hey fellas!" She called, waving. "Who'd like to help me and my friend get dressed?"

When they scampered back to the inn, piles of clothes in their arms, the only thing that dissuaded them from watching her put them on was the hulking, wet Saiyan glaring at them in the doorway.

* * *

Bulma had been asleep over eighteen hours. He wondered drily when she was planning on waking up. Upon reaching the ship, she had tossed the capsules onto the kitchen counter and fallen into bed, snuggling into the covers and informing him thickly that she was "toasted. Will you please man the ship for awhile?" Which wasn't hard to do. He set the controls on auto pilot and turned the gravity up to punishing levels. He hadn't trained for weeks, and his muscle loss was apparent to him. But most of all, he needed to burn away the memory of the _Eeyuris_ camp and Bulma's face, twisted in grief and bathed in candlelight. It was eating at him, and the more he tried escaping it, bowing at the altar of masochism, the more it pursued him.

As the days wore on and he submerged himself in the familiar, training under intense levels of gravity, he couldn't help but notice Bulma's inquisitive glances when he descended the stairs to partake in a very large meal.

As he flicked tuna onto a slice of bread with a spoon, he did a double take. Bulma sat at the kitchen table, legs crossed as she spread tuna onto crackers. Sketches and small metal pieces cluttered the table, and in the center of it was a device that looked like a misshapen radio. It wasn't the object that held his interest. It was the way she sat, submerged in thought, self assuredly uncrossing and crossing her legs, scribbling down notes and frowning briefly in thought before again setting her frenzied pen to paper. A storm surge of desire and possessiveness claimed him, and he clenched his fists, painting his knuckles white. He gnashed his teeth, his breath shallow as his vision flooded red. He was looming over her before he could blink, chest heaving. Sensing his shadow, Bulma slowly looked up at him, dimly registering his weird behavior. Her mouth parted like she was going to say something, then clamped shut. Blood rushed through him, pounding out a rhythm in his head. He felt his energy gather, a second skin, vaguely tingling as it answered his summons.

Not his. His other half. The beast inside him scented prey. Before he had a chance to analyze his actions, ki flared resplendently around him, washing the lower chambers in blue. He drank it in like ambrosia. It all seemed so perfect, so fitting-the red of conquered blood, the blue of Saiyan royalty. The power tasted as sweet as any nectar, as sweet as the junction at her thighs. His cock stiffened as he recalled tasting her. His energy pulsed around him threateningly. He felt deadly, he felt omnipotent, and that's when the beast inside him spoke to him.

_This is power_, it whispered. _This is who you are. This is what the Prince of Saiyans feels like._ His eyes slowly grazed Bulma's slack face. He hardly noticed her hand slapping his cheek. _This is yours,_ the beast rumbled._ Take what you deserve. And you deserve it all,_ it hissed. His erection throbbed, his energy spiking. _You are a born conquerer._ Bulma's plump lips were asking him something, but he didn't hear. His senses narrowed onto their shape, his mouth descending on hers, which instinctually parted. He plundered her mouth with his tongue, tasting the sweet tang of her. He wanted to fall into her mouth. He wanted to feel her silky skin under her shirt, her soft hair trailing on his naked skin. He wanted to rut her in the bloody jumble of body parts. Something inside him recoiled. He wanted to make love to her all day, swallowing her kisses fervently while they lost chunks of time in delicious, wet heat. No, he thought. That's not right. Something's not right. He numbly registered her lips moving again as he stood there, immobile, ki undulating around him.

Suddenly he felt a shock of water against his face, drenching his shirt. He blinked in a stupor and shuddered.

"What the hell?" He shouted to no one. Bulma stood a few feet from him behind a chair, a tense purposefulness dominating her body.

"Vegeta?" She asked warily.

Vegeta stripped off his shirt and wiped off his face, eyes wide with shock.

"Vegeta?" She asked again experimentally.

"What?" He barked, unsettled.

Her face crumpled into a scowl. "I think those ki cuffs might have messed with your physiology. Your ki was all over the place. Had you powered up any higher, you would have blown us to smithereens!" Her hands drew together, and she stood wringing them, perplexed.

He frowned down into his cupped palms, urging the answer from them.

The woman didn't need to worry about him anymore.

Vegeta pinned her with a commanding look that, to Bulma, just came off harrowed. "It was nothing," he grunted.

He took the stairs two at a time and slammed the door, engaging the gravity to its maximum.

The answer was in the supplication of his body to greater forces-pride and gravity-just like it had always been. He was sure of it. After all, training was an exercise most of all in control. The beast would not one up him again. He'd make sure no one would.

* * *

Next time, the pair is intercepted by another space ship, manned by a person more powerful, and more vile, than Vegeta. Can Vegeta defend them, even as his demons tear him into two? Expect the next chapter soon!

Also, fellow authors-is there a forum or a site any of you frequent to discuss BxV fan fiction? If there's a community I'm missing out on, please let me know! I would love to hash out DBZ with other authors, if only I were in the know! :/


	10. Bull In The Heather

Disclaimer: Toriyama had his chance. If I owned it, I would be putting a lot of fan fic writers to work. ::Vote springandbysummerfall in 2012::

__Bull In The Heather_

Bulma twisted the knobs of the radio, listening to different channels boasting distinct types of static with her chin in her hand. So far, she was only picking up muffled, tinny conversations, and nothing relevant at that. She stifled a sigh and kept turning the dial in bored curiosity. They were five days off from Earth and Vegeta had, as usual, locked himself in the gravity room. She was relieved that he had, to be honest. She was beginning to think he had come unglued. Any time they were in the same room, Vegeta ogled her with a preying intensity, his normal smooth gliding now a hungry slinking, his typical dark humor now a predatory silence. She wasn't afraid for her life; she was more afraid of his sudden lack of control. Vegeta had always prized himself on his self control, and through it, his ability to dispatch his foes impishly, ruthlessly, and confidently. But his control seemed to have slipped since he had awoken in a small rented room with cracked, yellow paint in Tent City. His assurance had taken on a desperate quality that reminded her a little of his frenzied bum's rush on Namek. Not only did his behavior toward her trouble her, but he was working himself into a froth in the gravity room. She was used to his stubborn perseverance, but this kind of training was altogether the path to madness.

She had come knocking on the gravity room door yesterday, only to stop in her tracks when she heard his wild laughter. Pressing her ear to the door and frowning with absorbed concern, his guffawing drifted into a long moment of silence. Tapping her finger to her lips with worry and arms crossing with concern, she debated what she should do when the door had suddenly burst open. Vegeta stood there with a half cocked and wicked grin, his pupils dilating as he focused in on her. She froze, emitting a stupid nervous giggle.

"Well, hello there, Onna." The muscles in his body jumped with restraint. "Come to view the show?" He all but whispered it, a discomforting caress.

"I...I just came to tell you dinner is ready."

"Good. I'm hungry," he confided, lingering over the word.

"Okay," she responded with remarkable aplomb. She turned on her heel and tried not to run down the stairs. Trembling, she made her plate and set down stiffly at the kitchen table. Only, Vegeta never showed. Not until she was in the shower, getting ready for bed, did she hear the dampened clang of the stairs over the pounding water...and she could have _sworn_ she felt him linger outside the bathroom door.

No, she didn't fear for her life...but this was not a Vegeta she knew or understood. This was more than just lust. And although he was making her jumpy, she was even more so intrigued. The scientist in her pondered the puzzle. What caused the change? In extreme moments-like the time he kissed her-his ki fluctuated violently. His ki may have synced with his emotions somehow.

The obvious perpetrator was the ki cuffs. Vegeta had insinuated he'd had to wear them before, but he hadn't mentioned whether or not they'd affected him like this. She wondered if he was out of balance in some way. After all, many gurus on Earth said that the ki flowed through seven different locations on a person's body, and if an opening was blocked, it could offset the flow of ki in marked ways to weaken them. But Vegeta seemed, in those intense moments, anything but weak. In fact, he seemed beyond his limits of power. Like his body was on the cusp of something greater than it, but his mind hadn't caught up, in the same way her suit had increased his powers to intolerable levels and caused the gravity room to crumble in on him. She feared that disconnect in him. Since he had settled in at Capsule Corp, the rash, slow burning Vegeta on Namek had been replaced by a safe, albeit prickly one. She was able to expect certain reactions from him. But this Vegeta seemed on the edge of unrestrained...irresistibly so.

She was worried by her _own_ reaction to him. She didn't think he would force himself on her, but if he went there...she didn't know that she _wanted_ to resist. It was like the animal in him brought out the animal in her. Every time he had an episode of wild, unruly ki, she was, at first, shot through with concern that he was becoming increasingly fractured; lately it was competing with a surge of wet heat between her legs, a leaping pulse, a languid, swaying desire. Their bodies were talking to one another, but their minds were in totally different dimensions. She had hoped once they got off planet that they could begin working on their budding relationship. Instead, they were sabotaged by this unexplained madness. Maybe the gurus could ascertain it, but they weren't even on Earth.

She supposed she had the next best thing-the Earth's wealth of knowledge on ki science. The only problem was that she would have to wait until they returned to Earth until she could start experimenting. She had no materials here. As she fiddled with the dial on the radio she had made from spare parts, she chewed over the possibility of a ki serum that could level him back out. When they had been working together on the ki enhancement suit, she had researched plenty of ways to enhance or disrupt ki...unfortunately, a ki enhancement serum could make him even more out of whack. He was at a loss for something. Ki enhancement could boost what he had, but not rectify him. Until she could get back to her lab, she was just crossing her fingers that they could both hold out on the crazy.

A clear male voice rang throughout the room on the radio. Bulma startled and listened in closely.

"...50 AU's ahead. Unknown allegiance, unknown origin...small craft...set to intercept in less than one standard hour."

Her curiosity piqued.

"Roger that, Nova. What's the procedure?"

"Docking and boarding by force until possible threat subdued. Repossession of the ship. Incarceration of suspects until identities are cleared."

"Why all the red tape, Captain?"

"Possible insurgent, as tipped off by former Captain of the Guard, Zarbon, sir."

Bulma's breath caught and cold fear filled her.

"Heard and verified, Nova. We await your orders."

"Roger that."

The transmission went silent. It took her a full minute until she realized all that she could hear was her own heart hammering.

She raced up the stairs and pounded at the door of the GR. It swung open, and Vegeta narrowed his eyes at her, wiping sweat from his face and chest with a towel.

"We're going to be intercepted," she informed him in a rush. "By someone important."

"And how do you know this?" He threw the towel over his shoulder and crossed his arms. His posture indicated calm, but his nostrils flared and his eyes roamed over her, which she did her best to ignore.

"I was scanning through transmissions out in space on the radio I built. I overheard two men talking about intercepting a small ship...a ship reported by Zarbon."

He simply stared at her. At first she didn't think he believed her. She knew what she heard, and it was specific enough to their situation to be alarmed. But then power started gathering around his feet, becoming tangible around his hardening face until it appeared so solid that, if she reached out to touch it, it looked like it could cut her to the bone. And there it was-a rapidly escalating, stuttering aura, the back and forth flicker of energy a strobe light against steel walls.

"They've come to the right place if they're looking for a fight," he growled ominously.

"We need to think of a plan. Fighting power is good, but we need a strategy," she urged.

"No one makes it out alive in a fight with the Prince of all Saiyans."

Bulma stared at him dumbly. "Ohhhkay, your strategy is just shoot to kill, then? Well, what if they overpower you with ki weapons, like last time? We at least need a backup plan."

His glower turned hostile, and ki grew and lashed around him.

"Relax, tough guy. It was only a suggestion. I just worry, that's all," she consoled, resting her hand on his shoulder. His eyes closed at the contact, and she heard what sounded curiously like purring.

She wasn't sure if reasoning with him was the best avenue while he was in this state. Maybe petting was?

Curiously, she laid her other hand on his opposite shoulder and squeezed gently, stepping closer into him and looking up into his face, which looked down on her with an intimidating intensity.

"I mean, do you want me to hide? To stand behind you? Maybe I can rig something up quickly with my spare parts in case they try anything dirty."

He pressed her to his chest, and she let out a little breath at the force behind it.

"I'll take care of it." His assurance was pitched low as he nuzzled her ear.

This kind of...affection...was new. She was reminded of his confession about making love to her as he was lying on the floor of the Exalted's, a conversation he clearly did not remember having. Was...was his unbalanced ki making him more emotional, more animal? There was no disputing this with him right now. She was going to have to deal with this later, and covertly. But maybe she could at least redirect the crazy.

It wouldn't be manipulating, not this time, as it was in her lab...because, this time, she heeded and recognized his feelings. This time, she was putting herself on the line as much as he was.

She needed him to listen to reason because she loved him.

She drew closer to him, resting her face in the crook of his neck.

"Let me help in some way," she murmured, stroking his broad back, her palms slipping lightly against his sweat slicked skin.

He gripped her shoulders, inhaling her scent and taking her ear lightly into his mouth. She shivered, which earned a satisfied growl from him.

She was in danger of being lost to the animal herself.

His tongue slid down her neck and she stiffened, trying to stay in control. His teeth nipped at her collar and her nipples involuntarily hardened. Her hands grazed his back and rested at the back of his neck, her nails scraping lightly against his nape with a mind of their own. She sighed into him as his hands stroked her sides, trailing light kisses against her neck. She cupped his face and gently pulled him towards her, breathing in his breath. They stood like that for a moment, until her lips pressed lightly against his, and again, only this time taking his bottom lip in her mouth.

Ki crackled around her, and Bulma glanced up in surprise. Little streaks of electricity jumped from his aura, seeking refuge. With alarm, she disengaged from his lips slowly, pulling back to look at him.

"You probably shouldn't do that around the gravity console," she suggested huskily. Her eyes widened with alarm when she remembered the real gravity of the situation. "Who do you think we're dealing with, Vegeta?"

"Pirates. Ex-soldiers." He shrugged. "No one I can't handle. Power level or greater numbers, it doesn't matter. " He nipped her chin and squeezed her hips, pressing them slightly into his own while he licked her bottom lip. "This Prince has remarkable endurance."

Her breath caught in her throat and a bolt of lust heated her through. This wasn't what they needed to be doing right now. They needed to strategize for all possibilities. In Vegeta's characteristic, unrelentingly stubborn way, he thought himself impervious. To any thing, anybody. No one could hold a candle to him. She didn't doubt his strength among most men, but she still worried about his well being. Look what happened last time. Although he was stronger than Zarbon, Zarbon was still able to overpower him with tech. And that tech is exactly what scared her. With cuffs like that out there, who knew what the incoming ship was armed with, or the soldiers manned with?

His tongue descended into her mouth, and all rational thought left her brain. His mouth was warm and oh so delicious.

His fingers hooked in her belt loops and held her there as he plundered her mouth for secrets. She ran her hands lightly down his chest, grazing his flat nipples. With a sharp growl, he grabbed the backs of her thighs and hoisted her against the door frame.

She couldn't say no the salt of his mouth, his teeth against her neck, his slick skin under hands. She had hoped to subdue the beast, but instead had awoken them both. Growling, she sunk her nails into his lower back and swept his mouth with her tongue.

His aura flared with crackling energy. A growl grew in him until it was a roar filling his senses. All he could see was her wild blue eyes, her disheveled hair, her pouting, wetted lips.

_She senses the animal in you_, it whispered to him. _She yields to it. __**Rut her**__,_ it urged him gravelly.

His fingers grazed her thighs, tracing upwards to the V between her legs and gripping her there. She snarled and thrust her hips at him just as the lights went off in the cabin, while the crunching of metal sounded from below deck.

"Power disabled. Prepare to be boarded," chimed a toneless voice from her console.

In the dark, pressed up against the door frame of the gravity room with only a few red and yellow emergency lights glowing on the console to light the couples fervent faces, they kissed, tongues meeting dreamily.

"The only thing you have to be scared of," he whispered roughly against her mouth, "is what I'm going to do to them when they walk in that door."

The moment broke into shards as they heard the door slide and boots tread in.

He released her and she stood on wobbly knees, regaining her bearings and glancing around in confusion as Vegeta shielded her.

_What the fuck?_ She wondered, running her hand through her hair. Her composure broke as a dozen soldiers poured into the room, training their guns on them.

Vegeta turned and faced them, and just as his sleek blue ki rippled around him, sparking in a spurious flurry against the near complete darkness, the soldiers guns drooped.

"Care to dance?" He asked leisurely.

After a moment, one of the soldiers in the front stepped forward, hesitantly. "S-sir," he stuttered. "This is a surprise." He gestured to the others. "Weapons down! Radio Lord Cooler," he barked at one of the soldiers.

Vegeta's ki flared icily around him.

"Lord Vegeta," he addressed Vegeta again, bowing. "We didn't know you were aboard this ship. Frankly, we didn't even know you were alive. Lord Cooler should answer any questions you should have," he said as another being swept the room.

"Vegeta," it purred. "It's just my luck you'd show up as I sought to consolidate my brother's empire. Ah, well. How have you been since killing my brother on some godforsaken planet in the middle of nowhere? Where have you been all this time?"

Bulma looked back and forth from Vegeta to this new interlocutor with apprehension. He loomed tall and wide before them, a thorned white breast plate and helmet crowning his mostly masked features. All she could see were dead red eyes and a leer. His toes were webbed, three toes on each "foot" clawing at the floor like a birds. A thick purple tail curled in the air behind them.

"Honing my skills so that I could hack you into pieces, in the same way your brother was laid to rest," Vegeta reassured him.

_Oh, lay on the charm, Vegeta!_ She yelled at him in her head.

"I'd be happy to oblige you. And who is this?" He nodded disinterestedly toward Bulma.

"I'm his mechanic," she offered.

Vegeta sent her a glare. He was in no mood for dissembling, his pride bursting as it was at the intrusion.

"I have plenty of engineers on my ship," Cooler sniffed.

And that's when the pieces came together.

"I was stranded on M183, sir," she pronounced in her best military manner, straightening. "I was an engineer on Frieza's flag ship, but was taken hostage by the natives on M183 when my ship crash landed. Vegeta found me, sir, and ordered me to tend to his ship."

Vegeta shot her a look, and she sent him one right back that ordered him to just keep his mouth shut.

"A cast away, huh. Well, by all means, we will escort you back on to my brother's ship and get you squared away and reoutfitted. I guess it's never a bad idea to have extra hands in the lab," Cooler commented boredly, his head listing to the head, horns jutting upwards adversely. He nodded at one of his men, who trotted over to her.

Vegeta stiffened and growled.

"Surely you don't want to challenge me here in this little space ship, which will surely implode should one of us even sneeze," Cooler laughed haughtily, mistaking Vegeta's protectiveness for provocation. "You haven't even heard the best news yet." Cooler smiled grotesquely. "You are Frieza's heir, you know. His empire, I'm loathe to admit, is yours now. After all, you were his favorite little foundling. So much _pernicious_ potential. Lord Vegeta."

At Cooler's pronouncement, the soldiers dropped to their knees, bowing.

"Don't get used to it," Cooler snapped. "Shall we enjoy a dinner, then get down to business? I am so going to enjoy ripping you into pieces."

"Why bother. You're stalling the inevitable. Just like your brother did."

"Indeed! Oh, blunt Saiyans," Cooler wiped a mock tear. "My brother was wrong to exterminate your kind. You're such comedians! Let's get this over with already."

Vegeta's eyes ground into her, and she stood frigidly under their power. _Please just trust me,_ she begged. _Please just get me inside the ship so I can ransack their labs and make you better before you explode in a fiery blaze._ The fool was going to fight this Cooler, whoever he was, and his energy wasn't the least bit stable.

"You're not going anywhere."

"Where do you expect her to go? Do you want her to watch as I skin you alive?" He laughed. "What, did you become attached, Vegeta? I didn't think you had it in you. And where in the hell is your tail?"

Vegeta's aura flickered and flecked with black almost imperceptibly and Bulma's eyes widened. He cut the air with his hand. "I will come for her after I wipe the floor with you. I'll be more than happy to dispatch the universe of a Cold, although the lack of challenge will be a real disappointment."

The soldier gripped her by the elbow and started to lead her out the door.

"Don't touch!" Vegeta screamed, his ki billowing out around him and nearly sweeping them off their feet. Streaks of black and red tinged the insides of the flame of his energy, framing his wild gaze in sinister shades. The soldier dropped her elbow almost quick enough to make Bulma laugh. Instead, she watched with rapt concern.

"Don't touch. She is royal property," Vegeta rasped.

Bulma's eyes bulged. What the fuck did that mean?

Cooler sniffed. "Not for very long, monkey. Your empire will be mine shortly. I'll consider it dessert!" He laughed caustically. "Take her away. And don't touch her. Wouldn't want to upset my guest."

Bulma was led out the door, the perspiring soldier glancing back, hoping desperately that she was following. She felt Vegeta's eyes on her back.

The soldier led her into the ship, its insides washed in white, causing Bulma to squint. Through corridors and down through the hull, until he sidled into a room and opened a drawer, grabbing some clothing from a stack and handing it to her. Bulma unfolded it and it unrolled like a scroll in front of her. A blue unitard. He handed her a small scouter with a rosy lens and led her back into the hallway silently, opening a door at the end of the corridor on to a mess of people showering and grooming themselves in various ways. Bulma grimaced at the sight.

"Get your hair squared away with Gurna. That length isn't regulation for a third class. You were on that stinking planet for awhile, weren't you?" He commented, glancing distastefully at her hair. "Gurna," he called to a hunched old...woman?...with a frizz of orange hair and leathery skin. "Hair cut," he called out to her, pointing at Bulma's head, and then opened the door back up. "Report to O5 when you're done and we'll get your paperwork done."

"Paperwork?" Bulma squawked.

He nodded, leaning against the door frame conversationally. "So far Cooler has kept Frieza's computer system in place, so we'll just update your profile. It's a real coincidence that Vegeta showed up today. Cooler's been eyeing us like candy. He just boarded a few days ago."

"I can't believe that crazy Saiyan inherited the blasted Empire! I don't know if we'll be better or worse off," someone called out to him.

He shook his head and spoke to the new guy. "Fucking Zarbon. He's a head case anymore. He should have been the one to take control after Frieza was assassinated, but he went on a madcap jaunt to find Vegeta, and we haven't heard from him since."

"Oh, yeah?" Bulma tried entering the small talk casually. "Where is he now?"

"Hell if I know. I think Cooler mentioned him heading toward Irohroh 9 after he reported your ship, but who knows. He's been a looney since Vegeta killed his Lordship."

"How did you guys hear that Vegeta killed Frieza?" Worried the two men would see through her, she became inventive. "I mean...I just found all this out, like, today," Bulma finished lamely, trying for convincing.

"Vegeta never told you? Well, I guess it leaked from Zarbon, probably stumbling across the universe and cursing Vegeta's name. I guess he barely made it out alive, but he told everyone about the golden Saiyan he saw handing Frieza his ass. Crazy that crazy Saiyan legend is true. Have you seen Vegeta transform yet?"

Bulma shook her head slowly.

"Well, I bet he'll wipe the floor with Cooler, if he had no problem making mince meat of Frieza. I only hope the ki shields hold up when they duke it out. I have a hot date tonight." He sulked.

"It's an engineers duty to check these things before a fight of this caliber. Where can I find a lab to get the tools before I go up there?" Bulma asked him as innocently as she could manage.

"Well, you haven't been cleared yet. After you swing by room O5, head to the West Wing if you want to mingle with the scientists. See you around." He gave her a short wave and the door closed behind him. She felt a hand close around her arm and pull her into a chair. She stared at herself in the mirror, deep in thought, as the alien draped a plastic covering over her shoulders and, to Bulma's surprise, started hacking off her hair.

* * *

Bulma prowled the West Wing with impatience. Where the hell were those labs? She stopped and fiddled with the scouter hooked to her ear. She knew it was programmed to give her coordinates of the ship, but she couldn't figure out the damned language, and she couldn't change a damn thing about it until she had some tools. Her arm fell to her side in exasperation and she kept walking, her white boots clicking softly on the tile. This was a race against time. She knew Vegeta could pack it away when he wanted, but no one's dinner lasted this long.

"Aha!" She cried, spying a bank of windows that stretched along the hall and opened out onto a large room furnished with lab tables, beakers, and rows and rows of file cabinets. She made her way in and was almost immediately stopped by a tall yellow alien with a hairlip.

"Woah, woah. Where are your orders to be here, little soldier?"

"Oh. Hi." Bulma cleared her throat. "I was just informed to come here and grab a few things for Lord Cooler. I just arrived aboard and he told me everything I would need to assist him would be down here."

"Oh." His eyes widened. "You're the engineer that came with Vegeta? Well then, let me show you around. You'll want to get familiar with this area since we'll be on the ship for about fifteen more standard months before we dock at Cooler's home planet. If he survives, of course." He rolled his eyes. "Saiyans." He waved her ahead. "After you."

Bulma looked over her new accessories with glee. The labs lacked exactly what she was seeking to restore Vegeta's ki, and she fought a lingering frustration over it. That was all speculation on her part, though. She could only guess what the problem and resolution was at this point. What was important was that she had the tools strapped to the capsule case around her thigh that would turn the tide should anything go wrong with the fight. She had confidence in Vegeta, but she was skeptical about how much battering his body could take before his ki started acting wacky again. She just wouldn't jump in unless it were absolutely necessary. She knew she'd never live it down if she took this fight away from him.

She hurried down the hall, rounding the corner until she hit a set of double doors and a guard.

She smiled sweetly. "Lord Cooler bade me check the room before Lord Vegeta challenges him."

The guard opened the door for her and gave a smooth smile of his own, and she gagged a little as she passed by him. "You're a little late," he called as the door closed behind her.

Glancing around the small, windowless room, she spied a large generator and a long, sleek console lining the walls. Glancing over the controls, she saw a set of gauges whose hands dipped, bouncing back and forth. Her eyes widened.

"Shit! They've already started! But how do I get in?"

She spied a vent and grinned with devilish delight.

* * *

Vegeta's face was being ground into the tile by a corded purple arm, until he kicked his legs out smoothly and swept Cooler off his feet. Delivering an impossibly fast roundhouse kick to Cooler's own face, Vegeta powered up to new heights, his ki jumping around him. The room flickered with new colors...The colors of Vegetasei and Saiyan royalty. Black and red filled Vegeta's vision, and the beast inside him rolled with pleasure.

Cooler laughed, spraying blood. "Do you think that I'll just hand over an empire? You are a pathetic monkey. You always were! How you killed my brother is beyond me, considering he always knew exactly how to bend you over his knee."

Vegeta's knee connected with Cooler's face, and Cooler slammed into the wall, sliding down heavily. "Admit it," he moaned. "You got lucky."

"I don't get lucky," Vegeta pronounced, surveying Cooler's bloody visage cooly.

"He's not the only one with a final form, you know."

"Try me. I'm getting pretty pissed you didn't just transform when we began this charade." Vegeta's eyes narrowed. "You've been holding out on me."

As Cooler powered up in a torrent of blue violet, Vegeta grunted as he recognized that Cooler was swiftly outclassing him.

With a grimace, he clenched his fists and powered up, following suit.

Vegeta's body stumbled and jerked to a halt. But his energy hadn't gotten the memo. His muscles bulged and burned and he screamed through his teeth, clutching his head as his rapidly fluctuating ki rushed through him. With a groan of anguish, Vegeta fell to his knees, just as Cooler's final form loomed over him, snickering.

"This has been fun, mammal, but now it's time for you to go." Cooler's leg raised as he prepared to decapitate Vegeta, just as a body dropped from the ceiling in Vegeta's purview. It swung around and pointed a gun straight at Cooler's back. Vegeta saw all this and nothing. His world was painted in a viscous black and red, his muscles quivering under the strain of ki several times the amount he was equipped to handle. But straining through the piceous, murky colors of energy that were swiftly consuming him, he saw a slender body shoot Cooler in the back and level the gun at him and shoot him, too.

He looked up into the blurred face of the intruder and fell into Bulma's fierce stare, her pretty face now capped with short hair and anchoring him in reality with a small, pink scouter.

"Get up," she spoke to him. He heard it as if under water. He looked towards Cooler with painful slowness and saw that he was falling to his knees, clawing at his back and frothing at the mouth. Bulma stood above him, hand on her hip. She was absolutely stunning.

That's when the beast came to life and claimed what was left of his body.

With a raspy roar, Vegeta's aura exploded around him, pure black and marbled ruby, and turned toward his adversary.

"You've trifled with the wrong monkey," said the beast. And he picked Cooler up and slammed him against the wall.

"Everyday," it rasped from Vegeta," for twenty years, I suffered defeat under the hands of your ugly brother and vowed to take my revenge. After my kingdom was taken from me, that was taken from me. Only to be humiliated," he punctuated his rage by slamming Cooler's head against the wall, "on two back water planets and to never arrive at my life's goal. Well, you'll do nicely," Vegeta bared his teeth cheerfully, "as restitution."

He squeezed Cooler's neck and wasn't even paying him a bit of attention as his head drooped loosely to the side and then fell right off, rolling between his feet. All he saw was blood red, a bright white moon, and the maws of an ape.

He craned his neck and screamed at the moon, pregnant with portents. "I AM THE PRINCE OF ALL SAIYANS! I AM THE LEGENDARY. THIS EMPIRE IS MINE."

His head swiveled when he heard a small sound.

Bulma stood watching him, gun hanging loosely in her hand, horrified.

"ARE YOU SCARED?" The beast asked. "YOU SHOULD BE."

Vegeta's eyes weren't even his own anymore. They glinted red, glancing off the red swirling in his blackened aura.

Bulma let out what might have been a whimper.

"YOU'RE MINE," it said, and as though reminded, it took a step toward her.

The double doors opened and soldiers began filing in, filling out around Vegeta, separating them. He sniffed the air, whipping his head back and forth as he watched each one with predatory intensity. Once they were all in the large auditorium, they dropped to their knees in near perfect unison.

"Long live Lord Vegeta!"

As though incited by the obeisance, Vegeta roared and beat his breast, ki a thick vortex around him. The soldiers gawked in amazement.

Bulma gaped as a single tear carved a path down her cheek.

She did the only thing she could do.

With one last try, Bulma strode through the soldiers toward Vegeta, who watched her with possessive, apish red eyes. Stepping into his ki, she grabbed at the back of his neck violently and kissed him with fearful abandon.

The auditorium erupted into cheers.

* * *

A/N: Alright, so it's official...

Not only do I have the last five chapters (you heard right, only five chapters left, if things go as planned) outlined and ready to be written, but I received my 50th "Reciprocity" follower this week. Fifty people receive an email while in the middle of the business of their lives when I update this story...to each of those fifty people, thank you, and I hope I don't disappoint.

If I could make it to 100 _reviews_, I would be one very ecstatic lady. I know it's possible; I've received six times that amount of views just for the month of September. -_- What do I have to do to woo you? Would you have me beg?


	11. Lost At Sea

_Lost at Sea

"_In your eyes I see the eyes of somebody_

_I knew before, long ago_

_But I'm still trying to make my mind up_

_Am I free or am I tied up?_

_In your eyes I see the eyes of somebody_

_That could be strong..._

_And now I'm pulling your disguise up_

_Are you free or are you tied up?_

_I change shapes just to hide in this place_

_But I'm still, I'm still an animal..."_

* * *

He hadn't let her go since she had kissed him.

In the thick of the whistles, applause, and hooting and hollering of the hundreds of action-starved, interplanetary soldiers on the Nova, he had stood still as her lips mashed against his in desperation. Her fingertips curled into the coarse hair at the back of his neck, and she slowly unscrewed her eyes to peer up at him, searching his face for any hint of the former Vegeta.

Her heart sank as his chilling red eyes pinned her to the spot, the sharp, noble planes of his face framed by a viscous, black aura as she pulled away.

But then, for just a split second, the regal angles seemed softened, out of focus.

Somewhere, in there, he loitered.

His gloved hands closed around her upper arm as he led her through the fray, the soldiers parting like a sea, catcalls extinguished as each soldier dropped subserviently to their knees as Vegeta neared. Vegeta, for all she could tell, didn't even know they were there.

She was too stunned to protest or ask where they were going, her mind wheeling with the events of the last few hours. Distantly, Bulma watched workers and soldiers aboard the ship bow deeply to them as they passed, trying to match Vegeta's ground eating stride. Should she nod or thank them? But at Vegeta's pace, she barely had time to consider it. She floated through the ship's white hallways with unease, though whether for fear of a warship full of extraterrestrials or Vegeta, she couldn't say.

Before she knew it, he had pulled her into the cabin of the ship, a wide view of the silent black space backdropping the crew as they jumped out of their seats in surprise and saluted.

"Welcome back aboard, your Lordshi-"

"Take me to Zarbon," Vegeta grated, dropping his hold on her arm and taking a step forward. "I have a blood bath to mete out. Send someone to confer with me on the Empire at the hour."

The crew scrambled to salute and chirped nervously. "Yes, sir!"

He grunted and swept out of the room, and Bulma turned on her heel to scamper after him.

He stalked down the hall, already far in front of her, his thick mane matted and his gloves coated in darkening blood, his posture stiff and threatening. Bulma watched him with worried absorption.

Vegeta was lost in there somewhere...Or was he?

Maybe he had been recovered, like a relic, a tomb opened, after a year and a half of being buried under Earthling custom, his aggression kept at bay by the lust to best Goku. And 'best' was being polite; right now, he'd take enormous pleasure in punishing Kakarot for each and every slight he'd had to endure since he and Nappa landed on Bulma's mud ball.

Bulma gazed at his back, wishing she could decipher him. Even after all this time, he was still a riddle at best. So what if she could more accurately gauge whether or not a certain muscle tic foreshadowed a withering insult or certain death than others? He was a puzzle that, once eventually coming together to form a picture she almost recognized, the pieces would suddenly become all inside out and she'd have to start putting him together all over again.

That was a major difference between her...relationship...with Vegeta, versus the one between her and Yamcha. She and Yamcha would have a good few months followed by a nuclear blow out and she could take that to the bank. Vegeta was a code she couldn't crack, a lock she could almost, just almost, but just couldn't figure out how to pick. Whereas she was once able to count off Yamcha's imperfections all day, bemoaning the real lack of companionship and understanding in her love life for _years ('How on Earth did it last that long?')_, Vegeta was chock full of faults, and she was only drawn closer and closer, like a moth to a flame. Although they were just two men, it was like comparing apples to oranges, leaving her with little knowledge of how to handle an already withdrawn, unavailable, and volatile extraterrestrial houseguest.

It didn't help that, despite all of his hard work to discourage her from even speaking to him, she had developed feelings for him. At first, it was just curiosity about the standoffish alien; then an overwhelming desire to show him up and impress him, enflamed by his sharp tongue and high expectations; then inspiration and compassion, as he let her into his world without even noticing; and then lust -a sneaky, overpowering desire that overlaid every one of their interactions...and now what? She had admitted that she loved him _('_gulp_...had she really?') _as she cried over his decimated body in the Eeyuris camp, but she found it very likely he didn't recall a thing, and, at this moment, that was fine by her. He had been feverish and in and out of consciousness, and more telling, he hadn't retreated from her once they had escaped. In fact, he seemed anything but scared off.

She remembered packing groceries away into the cupboards of the small kitchen on the ship, after she had woken up from a long sleep and taken a much needed shower. Throwing her wet hair over her shoulder as she stretched her body on her tip toes as tall as she could go and fumbling to shove the box into the cabinets, she felt her hair stand on end and instinctually glanced towards the stairs, and saw him: stopping her heart with an intense, heated once over as he stepped silently from the last stair, his eyes dragging down and then oh so slowly up her body, before smirking and walking past her cooly, brushing against her shoulder on his way towards the refrigerator...and once she lowered back onto her heels, eyes widening with misgivings _('What the hell has gotten into him lately?')_, her brows pinching together as she questioned his sanity, she suddenly stiffened as she felt something predatory right behind her...and turning her head slowly to look over her shoulder... her world narrowed down to his lips, just a few inches away, pulled upward at the corners with blackhearted intent, his hot breath hitting her face...and she felt him drag a fingertip up her bare lower back...and his body was suddenly pressing up against her, pinning her between him and the counters...and he rested his hand on her hip as he leaned forward and plucked the box from where she had so painstakingly deposited it, and grinned as he rumbled, "I'm hungry," his lips sounding out his amusement so softly against her cheek. And just like that, he turned and made his way casually to the table stuffing his face with dry cereal, his damned calves and ass tightening with each step. She had stuffed the rest of the groceries into the cabinets hastily and then made a break for the bathroom, ignoring his self satisfied smile. That was what was dangerous to them: his own feelings for her. She, despite her hard headed nature, would have given up the long fight once he knocked her on her ass outside the GR. Instead, he had pulled her back in, however tentatively. He wanted her. And now it was all complicated by the animal just under his skin.

That aura, those eyes...it was absolutely bestial. She couldn't remember seeing him like this on Namek. Cunning, selfish, charged up and trailing an electric blue aura with fearless belligerency, sure. But this was more like...her stomach dropped. Like Oozaru. The ruby eyes, the thirst for domination and violence.

But...but how could he become Oozaru without his tail? Was this some sort of attempt by his Saiyan physiology to become Oozaru by other means? If this was Oozaru, then he should have control over himself, right? Unlike Goku, he had learned to ignore the pain in his sensitive tail and think rationally while transformed. But was he in control now, or wasn't he?

He had always been single minded as far as she knew him, but if given the choice to sacrifice his humanity for power and revenge...would he?

Where did Oozaru end and Vegeta begin?

Vegeta halted in front of a door in the middle of the hall. Briskly entering a pin on a pad fitted against the doorjamb, Vegeta's gloves left dark smudges on the illegible alien numerals. The door slid open with a hiss. Fluorescent lights blinked to life, and Bulma followed him warily in.

It was just a meager white room. In the far corner was a cot and a night stand. Perforated holes decorated the metal walls, some blackened at the edges, an Impressionist display of streaks of carbon and scorch marks that climbed up the walls like electrified vines. The tile in the middle of the floor blushed a dull copper, as though it had once been a stubborn stain, frequently scrubbed.

Vegeta's hands begin to glow as a wind of energy suddenly whipped at her.

Her eyes widened.

"This was your room," she whispered.

Vegeta turned slightly and cut her a sidelong look, his eyes exquisitely enraged.

"Vegeta, what happened in here?"

Without warning, Vegeta let our a tormented roar and hurled the swirling ki ball at the bed, which exploded upon impact. The room was far too tiny for the blast however, and Bulma threw her hands in front of her face protectively as the hot black energy whorled towards her.

The blast never hit, though, and when she peeked between her fingers, Vegeta's shadowy aura had extended over her...protectively.

Vegeta began powering up violently, the energy emitting a piercing whine and harmonizing with his growing, frustrated yowl. Despite the hair on her body standing alertly on end, her hand instinctively dove into the ki and clasped his arm.

"Vegeta! You'll blow up the ship!"

"But the opportunity to is just _so_ irresistible." His voice was garbled and ripe with a promise for brutality.

She shivered.

"It's not worth dying over!" She hollered over the crash of the nightstand against the wall, near enough that she cringed, the bed in her periphery spitting with flames, its frame mangled in a tumulted V shape. "Do you have a death wish? Or would you like to live another day as emperor of this Kami-forsaken empire?!"

She threw her hands up in the air at the confusion, a gesture that seemed so like the old Bulma that it caused the animal in him to take a step back in consideration.

Vegeta's ki had widened and taken over the entire room, lighting the room in a stark noir. His eyes glowed their intense ruby once again, creating a macabre picture. She recalled desire and blue ki licking the GR walls, except this time, the memory left her regretful. How had things spiraled so quickly out of control once Puar -poor, misguided, loyal Puar- hit a small red button?

To her complete surprise, although nothing about him appeared changed, she watched as Vegeta conceded.

"You're right. It would be foolish to throw it all away now. That is why we chose you." His red eyes stared blankly at her before regarding the mess, his face settling again into his almost normal, guarded mask.

Bulma's eyes widened with anxious confusion.

"Um, is there...is there somewhere else we can stay?" She asked it...him...delicately.

He nodded so very slightly, his aura vanishing with a rush of air, his eyes losing their intense vermillion. He strode out of the room, leaving it in darkened disrepair, the bed flaming nosily in the corner.

As she stepped back out into the bright hallway, a few crew members stood outside, mouths slack.

Bulma giggled nervously. Spotting a fire extinguisher and thanking Kami that aliens took fire safety seriously, too, she opened the door and handed it to the closest soldier. "Here ya go." She smiled broadly and tittered out a "thank you" before racing up the hall to catch up with Vegeta.

As she pulled up next to him, he reached out and clutched her arm, drawing her closer to his side while staring ahead hostilely.

Bulma stared at his hand with wide eyes, and then glanced back and forth between his grip on her and his menacing profile. Was he showing her affection!? Or was he just being possessive? Maybe he was just trying to hurry her up, Bulma thought skeptically, like when he picked her up at the Capsule Corp headquarters. She remembered that Vegeta with sad fondness. He seemed almost human, then. In nice black trousers and a long sleeved black crew neck, glancing at her with mirth, he looked way too handsome, way too human. Albeit stubborn on an impossibly and inhuman scale. Well, maybe she was, too. After all, they wouldn't have been estranged then if not for her refusal to respect his feelings that night in her lab. He had accused her of trying to tame him that night, and yet, with hindsight, he had begun the slow transition already.

Since falling back to Earth after chasing Goku around the galaxy, she suspected he'd grown into the habit of redirecting his frustrations with his whole Earth-problem from his usual cathartic slaughter to her. She could take it. Unlike the other idiots buzzing around Kakarot, she boldly stepped up to the plate. Even when sorely insulted, stomping out the door and calling him a dozen choice names, she couldn't help but come back for more. And instead of getting her under thumb, which he usually quite excelled at doing, he quickly began to look forward to how far he could push her next time without hurting her feelings irreparably and ruining the game. It...she...became his past time, his small obsession between the fridge and the GR. He slowly opened up to her in pursuit of the dead end which should have shown up already between their wits. And, every day, he was surprised to find the road seemed to just stretch out endlessly into the horizon.

No one had understood why Goku had spared Vegeta. They put their trust in their dear, eclectic friend, whose intuition was notoriously uncanny, and tried to stay out of Vegeta's way.

She, however, was the only one out of all of Earth's Z Fighters who didn't shrink back in fear or contempt, persecuting him before he could get a word in edge wise. He had always been flattened out by other's expectations of him -Frieza's, his father's, the ghosts of his dead race, the other elites of the Planet Trade Organization. His name had grown an identity of its own, always preceded a shiver or a curse, and he learned to wield it like a weapon. It was no wonder that he had learned to thrive in the role of master of mayhem and so effortlessly bear the burden of a galaxy's worth of loathing. He had never been given a chance to be otherwise, unless you want to count the few years he spent toddling around the Palace on Vegeta-sei.

Except to Bulma. His identity, his past, his obligations, his humiliations, were momentarily shelved, just so that they could quarrel...about who could claim the last piece of cake, about whether or not the bots in the GR were totally useless or only fractionally. For just a moment, the challenge of living as a shamed, isolated Saiyan could be ignored for the challenge of putting a mouthy blue haired woman in her place.

No one could understand how Bulma could just disregard his past atrocities in preference of arguing wildly with him. They assumed it was because she was a woman, whose romanticizing or teeter tottering emotions took priority over logic.

They underestimated her; they underestimated him. For whatever misunderstood reason, she was committed to keeping him afloat, whether by hospitality or sarcasm, even if that meant offering him her life jacket and treading water.

The only one who understood her attraction to him was himself. Although he ignored it, detested it, and denied it, he understood her fearless, compassionate curiosity, the same intense scrutiny she gave her inventions. They had momentarily turned inward while she caterwauled over Scarface, and then turned their full strength on him. And instead of scoffing at it -and to his disgust- he didn't mind the attention. When had anyone so innocent, so vibrant, given him an order, and in the same breath, a compliment? Before Bulma, no one had talked to him like that without getting a painful lesson in rank and respect.

He rarely left the compound, instead opting to spend most of his time in a grueling, day long workout; the only adjusting to be done to his new (and _temporary_) life on Earth was directly through Bulma and her hospitality.

And that adjustment to her had changed him.

But now, his new, unlikely humanity had been stripped, and he was operating off of animal impulses; his id had defrocked his consciousness, just as he had usurped Cooler. He was transformed in a myriad of ways, each with their own riddle to be solved.

And, if all this bowing was indicative of anything, the man also had new obligations. How could they find balance again? She was still determined to get him home so that they could go on their first date, like normal people! Forlornly, Bulma watched ship members bow deeply to them as they passed.

A deep, dark thought bolted through her. Was this...was this her fault? She was the one who shot him full of concentrated liquid ki when Cooler stood to execute him. She was the one who seemed to provoke him at every instance and drive him into a froth that would have otherwise been absent in his frigid, single minded mission...

Had her serum sent him over the edge? Were her beloved inventions, then, full of holes? Was she...was she not docile enough for him? Without her stressing him out, would he still be in one piece? The thought made her seriously squirm. If so, then she was simply guilty of being herself, and there was nothing she could do to fix it.

They approached a double door guarded on either side by two colossal beings whose muscles strained against black spandex. Their bulky, crested gold helmets had three thin slits at the mouthpiece, disguising their faces. She wondered how they could guard anything without sight.

Standing to attention, they propped open the door and then sank to their knee, fisting their right hand over their hearts.

"_Am'in nol mad'huhr, su'spek Ayin-Vegeta_." Their deep voices a litany in tandem.

A very self satisfied grin began curling across Vegeta's face. The long black lashes that gave him an almost boyish appearance close up, along with the wicked pleasure crossing his face, reminded Bulma of a young bully who'd gotten away with something very naughty.

Vegeta's head rocked backward on his shoulders smugly, and he leveled his gratified smirk back down at the guards. "Ehl no'mins vay'komenshur, friends. It is good to hear my native language again. Noch-oloh pu'lahshur amit aylin."

Vegeta led Bulma through the threshold of the opened double doors. They entered a vast domed hall, a set of scarlet double doors growing in the distance. How could an expanse of this magnitude fit into a ship, with no function, she wondered? There was nothing but the sound of their footfalls in silence and Bulma's quiet marveling until, overwhelmed by the new events, she spoke.

"What did they say to you?"

"They welcomed me back and congratulated me on fulfilling the prophecy of Planet Vegeta."

She glanced sidelong at his bemused, and yet ruthless, expression. "And what did you say to them?"

"I told them I told you so, and that I hadn't forgotten about the time they beat me to an inch of my life in the mess hall." He leered down at her with ruby eyes.

After staring at each other for a moment, she snorted and turned away. "Aren't you charming."

He snorted in what she took as agreement and quickened his pace toward the doors.

Once in front of them, Vegeta paused, and then gripped the old knocker knobs and pulled the heavy doors open impatiently. Light began to glow from within, and Vegeta stepped forward to enter first.

Bulma, her breath unconsciously held, released in a hiss of surprise. The room was sprawling, luxurious, and beautiful. Shaped in a V with the front door at its central point, each V 'arm' stretched into darkness and was covered in lush white carpet. Each 'arm' seemed to serve a different purpose. To the left, the interior was designed like a sitting room, albeit more suited to a harem, and a wintry one at that. Body pillows and chaises dripping in furs and pelts and a massive fireplace suddenly snapping to attention gave the room an indulgent air. The room beyond that, veiled by thin parchment dividers, seemed to be a study of some sort, although she couldn't tell with the low lighting.

The most notable thing about the 'arm' on the opposite side was the massive four poster bed in the center of it, white draperies shrouding the bedcovers from their sight, but not the ceiling, where a large mirror with an ornate frame overlooked, its craftsmanship removing any lewdness from its purpose. The path to the bed was littered in several kinds of glossy furs, some short haired and spotted, others a thick shag. Further inside was a wide, free standing glass shower, positioned so that anyone who entered or lounged on the bed could observe. Pressed up behind it was a mess of exotic flowers and vining plants, and just beyond that, darkness. Somewhere, she heard running water.

"What is this?" She asked hesitantly.

"A room fit for an Emperor." With brisk precision, he pulled his gloves off finger by finger and chuckled, taking the room in. His chuckle grew to a fit of laughter as he threw his gloves carelessly in a corner, crossing his arms as his laughter became wild and raking, his head thrown back by the force of his glee.

Bulma's brows knitted with worry, and she sighed. She stepped forward into the room cautiously. There was something about the space that seemed insidious, but she couldn't put her finger on it. The young girl inside of her was jumping up in down in a flurry of excitement at the bed, the fireside, the carpets, the shower. The woman born in the Eeyuris camp looked on with wary vigilance. _Everything comes with a price,_ it reminded her.

She sidled up next to him and ran her hand down his hard back, grime catching against her palm. His laughter dried out like a smothered flame and he stiffened.

"Why don't we wash up?" She offered and set her gaze toward the shower, advancing slowly toward it, when she spotted something behind it. Glancing over the intricate tile work as her boots left carpet, she preceded toward the sound of running water just beyond the flora. Just around the bend of the bell jar-like shower was an enormous bath, cradled partially by the flourishing plant life and partly by beautifully pebbled rock rising all the way to the ceiling, surely quarried from the finest enslaved planets. From the direction of the shower, a stream of water ran down smooth slabs of rock, creating a waterfall that tumbled into the tub. As she peered into the burbling water, hundreds of bright blue pinpricks, like a mass of fireflies, lit from within the tub, and she inhaled sharply.

The hair on the back of her neck rose in response to some invisible predator, and she instinctively looked up at Vegeta.

He stood against the darkness with one side of his mouth crooked in a barbed smirk.

Bulma froze like an animal caught in the beams of a headlight.

He seeped menace and impulsive viciousness; but instead of her heart pitter pattering in fear, a heavy warmth descended over her and feathered down her belly and through her core. It was an insane way to feel, insane to love a predator, a villain of her home world.

With all the anxious strength she could muster, she tried to turn away from him, break the moment. For both their sakes.

But her body scrapped her judgment and rejected her friends' caution. To her shock, desiring him even felt quite safe.

Her body, in fact, seemed roiling in anticipation of the promise of sexual vehemence that his body was suddenly whispering to her own.

She had lost control of the situation the minute Vegeta had stepped into her life, first taunting her friends fearlessly, then using them as collateral on Namek in a raucous gamble to one-up the tyrant who had made him a pawn.

On Earth, as he sought to acclimate to an entirely different way of living, thinking, feeling, and fighting, his resentment toward Goku and Earth became gradually annexed by the battle of wits between him and a blue haired wench. A sneaky tug of war between passions had crept up on the two headstrong fighters.

Neither of them had signed up for this, and yet, here they were. First chasing after one another on Earth, then on the trade planet, and now, having slain an intergalactic ruler and acquired his ship, his army, his empire...what were they to do now?

She supposed this was one way to hitch a ride back to Earth in style. But there was something really wrong with Vegeta that needed attention _now_. She could tolerate his aggression -but his aura, those eyes, that voice...

"Take off your suit," it said to her, his lips curling upwards with dark gluttony.

It was then that Bulma's mind left her. After all it's work to stay in one piece, there was no convincing it of resisting the sexual savagery seeping out of him.

Spellbound, Bulma shucked off her white boots and, bare feet on the cool tile, twisted her arm back to begin slowly unzipping her suit under Vegeta's hard gaze.

Time stood still as the zipper made its way to the end of the line, and she tugged lightly at her sleeves, letting the top fall to her waist. Although he hadn't moved, Vegeta watched as if on edge. Gaze turning down passively, she shimmied out from the waist of her suit and kicked it free once it fell to a pile at her feet.

As she turned to step up into the bath, Vegeta's rough voice halted her.

"No." His jet gaze seemed manic, his fists clenched at his sides as if to control himself from lashing out. "No...take mine off, too."

Bulma barely recognized the change in his eye color from ruby to black as she was pulled like a puppet on a string. She felt as though she were floating. In the blink of an eye, she was resting her cheek against his, breathing him in. What was it about his smell? The comfort of a man who knows what he wants. She was vaguely aware of Cooler's blood slicking her breasts and belly. What was it about his neck that caused her lips to hover over it, her teeth worrying on her bottom lip as one hand delved into his hair, the other sliding over his shoulder to make its way single-mindedly to his zipper? Her fingers pulled it down as her lips drifted up his neck and settled over his own, licking them hungrily as the zipper reached its zenith and her hands pushed it off his broad shoulders. Just as she tugged it off his arms, she sunk her teeth lightly, playfully into his lower lip before sinking to her knees. Slipping her fingers under the loose fabric at his waist, she looked upwards, past his narrow, muscle-packed waist and scarred chest to watch him watching her, red glinting in his cold black stare.

She rested her lips gently against his taut lower belly as she slowly inched his suit down, his body heat flaring against her face. As the suit made its descent over his hips, her hot breath on the V of his hairless stomach, his member sprang free from the suit to hang heavily next to her cheek.

"Vegeta," she called out huskily to no one in particular.

One moment she was staring down his pulsing manhood with mouthwatering preoccupation, the next she had been scooped up in his arms, her ass skimming across warm water, and pressed against the rough rock wall in the bath. He slicked her hair out of her face, his cock identifiably hot against her inner thigh.

"Join with me, Bulma," he rasped in her ear before resting his nose against hers. His face, ever set in ruthless indifference, was alive with rapt need. She hadn't seen him this impassioned since Namek.

"_Yes_," she panted, pushing his head into the crook of her neck with abandon. "I want you," she gasped in his ear. The dark truth came tumbling out of her. "I've always wanted you. From the moment I saw you on the television, from the moment you stole my dragon ball, from the moment you stepped foot in my house..."

"_Fuckkk," _he hissed, as he positioned himself at her hot entrance.

"Please, Vegeta, I need you-"

He plunged inside her smoothly, her fingernails clawing his shoulders as her head hit rock, but not with enough force to knock her away from desire.

He began bucking against her feverishly, his foot resting on the lip of the tub, her leg thrown over his thick thigh as he surged inside her. His hands slicked over her hips and moved to clutch her short hair with strong hands. She struggled to rock against the force of his thrusts, crying out.

"_Did Scarface ever please you as much as I do?"_ He asked her, voice scraping.

"Never," she moaned, "Never!" Her tight grip on his shoulders drew blood, and her eyes swelled with tears. "Vegeta!" She cried out in desperation, biting her lip against the small gasps of air escaping her after every excruciatingly delicious thrust.

Vegeta began laughing crazily, and her eyes, clenched in pleasure, opened to view his own black ones staring down at her fondly.

"_Mine_," he demanded harshly, his gaze warm but immovable.

"Yours," she keened hoarsely, before he whipped them around and lay her against the flat rock slabs, her head resting in the stream of water, rushing around her ears.

He loomed over, smirking as he pulled ever so slowly out of her. She tensed and looked up at him in cloudy panic. Just as she opened her mouth to complain, he rammed into her, smiling toothily.

Once again, he inched out of her, and she gripped the rock waterfall under her side, scraping her palms.

"I want to hear you beg, Onna," he crooned.

"Please, Vegeta," she panted with anguish.

"That's not good enough, Onna." The slick head of his penis slipped out of her and rested patiently against her lips. He grabbed it and tapped it against her, 'tsk'ing disapprovingly, and she jerked, gasping. She pulled roughly at his shoulders, and he allowed himself to fall on top of her, catching himself with his left hand but keeping his right steadily on his dick, brushing his knuckles against her sensitive clit with every stroke.

"I'm going to put it in you," he promised silkily, "but only if you beg me. Beg me, Bulma."

She moaned in anguish and wrapped her arms and legs around him, rubbing them against his back and hips. She clenched at her hair but released it, tufts sticking out haphazardly, and slipped her palms down his shoulders to rest at his thick hips.

"Kiss me," she pled.

"Beg me," he demanded.

He ran his other hand from her calf up her thigh, sneaking between her legs to tease her as he continued to rub his thick tip and knuckles against her.

Bulma let out a sob.

Straightening using only the strength of his core, Vegeta's other hand raked up her side and curled around her breast, brushing his palm lightly against her hardened nipple, and then squeezing it roughly.

Bulma's core clenched excitedly around him, and she felt him throb in response.

He lowered his face to hers as she squirmed in his hands, grinning fiendishly in her face.

"Do it. Beg me. Let me hear you beg me to fuck you, Onna." His tongue slipped out and flicked teasingly at her pebbled nipple.

She choked. "Please." She gulped. "Please, Vegeta. I need you...I need you...to fuck me."

"And what if I don't?" His grin was foreboding.

"Please, Vegeta, I'll do anything, _anything_..."

"That's what I wanted to hear, Onna," he reassured her darkly, and slowly slipped inside her, and then, oh so carefully, began rocking back and forth inside her, arching himself towards her sweet spot.

She cried out brokenly and bucked against him as his precise, angled thrusts began whipping up a storm inside her. She pulled him down on top of her, their chests, slick with sweat, rubbing enticingly against each other. She panted into his ear and at the back of his neck, and he drove into her faster, grinding his hips against her. The rushing water under her head faded away as momentum built up inside them and her pants turned into rolling moans. Her stomach tightened and she fisted his hair in her hand as she pulled him deeper inside her as she felt herself about to come.

Just then, someone near them cleared their throat.

Bulma looked dreamily to the side from under Vegeta, only slowing their pace slightly.

There kneeled a very pale crew member, his cap shaking between his hands, his eyes glued to the floor.

Vegeta stilled and peered slowly up at him, and the man dropped his cap and dropped his head to the carpet.

"I am so, so sorry to interrupt, sir, but I was instructed to brief you on the Empire within the hour, Your Lor-"

Vegeta released a savage growl and his aura erupted around them, forming a billowing sheath around them. Crouching over Bulma protectively, Vegeta bared his teeth and cradled her head in his palms, blocking the man's view of her and caging her in a thick wall of chest and arms.

"MINE," he growled harshly.

She smelled sweat and the tang of their sex, and without thinking, she ran her tongue slowly up his neck.

He looked back down at her with a hunter's eyes, glowing ruby once again. "Mine," he said again, although less jarringly, as though trying to convince her.

"Yours," she agreed softly, caressing his face. She cupped her hands around his face and pulled him toward her own, kissing him softly, their mouths melding together. She felt him twitch inside her and she rocked against him slowly in primal response, eyes rolling back in her head. She felt a rumble from his chest and he quickly gripped her wrists and pinned them above her head, taking advantage by sucking on one creamy breast at a time and releasing it with a sucking pop to let it bounce satisfyingly. She let out a breathless whine and arched her back.

His vision narrowed and blacked at the edges, his already primitive logic fraying. All Vegeta saw was her throat, her belly up submissively. He saw the soldier, still on his knees in obeisance, avoiding looking at them, trapped between the conviction that he would be slain for interrupting him and the mixture of disturbed lust he felt watching them. Vegeta's aura, which had thinned momentarily, flared, humming, and with an unfamiliar emotion building up in his chest, Vegeta began pooling all his energy into powering up.

Bulma's eyes flew open. Vegeta was still inside her. He was feverishly hot inside her, his fiery ki energy drying their sweat as it created it.

Bulma began to feel lightheaded, and when his aura started flickering, Bulma's hand rose weakly to his face to get his attention, her mouth parting with unspoken fear.

Vegeta turned his gaze from the prostrated, terrified soldier to her, pinning her with cutting passion. With each flicker of his discordant aura, Vegeta's eyes flashed, red to black, like someone flicking a light switch.

"Vege-" she croaked, before Vegeta sank his teeth into Bulma's neck.

Bulma felt herself fall back into darkness.

* * *

A/N: A very special thank you to Quilapayuna (my heart swelled ten times its size with your comment), Holographic Universe, maymayB (fist bump!), WisdomAndWatersDaughter, Concrete Angel, my anon, Vagitis (I really enjoyed messaging back and forth with you!), betty69blue, HISTORY83 (I'm giving a G/C some thought!), HypsterGeeDragon (the battle did go by too fast, I agree!), kat, blonde22, PaleShadow (you're onto something! :) ), elleelle, Preciousblue, preciousjade76, threeam inkblot, BookLovinMom26, WhatWhat123, lintu-lvr4, XDarkAngelofLoveX (where did you go?), katrapolis, TheDeadlyColera, smalsa!, kerryann, vinny valentino (me either), sue, skinnychick, rhea0023, duoai, lilpumpkingirl…I hate to clutter up this author's note with a long list of names, but I value each and every one of your comments, so thank you so much! I know everyone has been waiting diligently for this chapter, and I know I've made some promises before, but you'll be happy to know the next chapter is already written…and good chunks of the Finale to Vigilantes and even the next chapter to Fever of Deceit are in the works as you read this. A very, very special thank you to cabellosdefuego, my wickedly insightful friend, everyone go read her A/U "The heart of a knight" and tell her she does a damned good job writing in English, and that despite all the pizza she's eaten she's drop dead gorgeous. You're my boy Blue!

Also, I changed my mind about there only being a few chapters left. Rejoice!


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